The Mobilization for Climate Justice West (MCJ-West) turned out 150 people on a Monday afternoon and marched to the SF financial district offices of Chevron, the Environmental Protection Agency and BP calling for Big Oil to stop harming our environment and communities and pay up for the damage they’ve caused.

A coalition of national, regional and local groups, activists with MCJ-West) blockaded the doors of the SF BP offices and the intersection in front of the building.

With a set of demands, MCJ-West organized one of the largest direct actions at BP to date with 15 arrested.

MCJ-West’s demands include:

* Moratorium on New Offshore Drilling. No Use of Dispersants. Full Access to Media and Civil Society.

* Big Oil corporations pay their debt to all impacted communities – Gulf Coast to Richmond, CA and around the world.

* Big Oil pay for community livelihood and ecosystem restoration, clean energy, public transportation, and health care for impacted communities.

* Big Oil Out of Politics!

Activists also delivered a letter from it’s coalition to BP.

Here’s the letter:

To: CEO’s of British Petroleum, Chevron, Shell, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Tesoro, and Valero

August 30, 2010

In the wake of the recent BP disaster, we are writing to express our concern over the oil industry’s continued disregard for the health of communities and ecosystems around the world. Mobilization for Climate Justice West is a coalition of organizations, some of which represent communities directly impacted by the oil industry’s extraction and refining operations; we are dedicated to promoting effective and just solutions to the climate crisis.

We call on the oil industry to accept responsibility for the damages your operations have caused worldwide and specifically to:

1. End the use of dispersants in cleaning up oil spills. Dispersants, such as the Corexit used in the BP disaster, are toxic chemicals whose long-term impact on ocean life is unknown. Using dispersants allows for better public relations for the oil industry since they make the oil less visible, while possibly making the long-term impact of spills even worse.

2. Grant full access to media and civil society in covering oil spills. During the BP disaster, there have been many complaints from journalists that BP restricted their access and ability to gain information. In July, the Society of Professional Journalists issued an open letter expressing their concerns over restrictions of press access to beaches and other sites in the Gulf.

3. Pay your debt to the communities that have been impacted by your operations. In the Gulf Coast, the oil spill has destroyed the livelihoods of many fishing and oystering communities. Communities are also impacted by oil extraction and refining in places like Nigeria, where an Exxon Valdez-sized spill has occurred every year since 1960; in Alberta, Canada where First Nations indigenous communities are experiencing abnormally high rates of cancer and a destruction of their traditional ways of life due to extreme water pollution from upstream tar sands operations; and in refining communities like Richmond, California where more than 25,000 people live within 3 miles of the refinery and the community suffers from high levels of asthma and other respiratory diseases. The oil industry must pay for the the restoration of ecosystems and community livelihoods, for the development of clean energy and public transportation solutions, and for healthcare to treat those whose health has been impacted by your pollution.

4. Stop funding fake “astro-turf” rallies. Last year the American Petroleum Institute, of which British Petroleum, Chevron, Shell, ConocoPhillips, and ExxonMobil are members, launched a fake grassroots campaign called “Energy Citizen” and bussed employees to lobbyist-organized rallies to oppose climate legislation that might limit climate pollution. Shell, publicly stated last year that it would not participate in “Energy Citizen” rallies. Now API is up to it again with a series of fake rallies to oppose removing billions in oil company tax breaks and opposing limits on offshore drilling. Will you join Shell’s pledge not to participate in what have been called “glorified company picnics”?

5. Stop lobbying against solutions to climate change and against regulations to protect our communities. Instead of using its profits to re-pay the debt to communities impacted by its operations, the oil industry funnels billions into lobbying to ensure that it will not be held responsible for its pollution. During the BP disaster, from April-June, 2010, the American Petroleum Institute spent $2.3 million on lobbying. According to the Washington Post, three fourths of all oil and gas lobbyists used to work for the federal government; the poor regulatory oversight of deepwater drilling is one result of this revolving door. The oil industry also lobbies against solutions to climate change; members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee who voted against the Waxman-Markey climate bill in 2009 received almost 3 times more in contributions from carbon-intensive industries than members who voted in favor of the legislation. In California, Tesoro and Valero are funding Proposition 23 on this November’s ballot to derail the implementation of California’s climate change legislation.

Sincerely,

Mobilization for Climate Justice West, Richmond Progressive Alliance, Communities for a Better Environment, Global Exchange, Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, West County Toxics Coalition, Gulf Restoration Network

[ view article @ It's Getting Hot in Here -- add your comments!]

As you may recall, a lively protest took place on the streets of Chicago’s financial district last November 30, on the 10th anniversary of the “Battle of Seattle” and a week ahead of the big UN climate summit in Copenhagen.  Several groups from across the city had come together to demand just, equitable, and effective solutions to the climate crisis, starting with the shut-down of the Crawford and Fisk coal plants in Chicago’s Little Village and Pilsen neighborhoods.  The November 30th (N30) event also targeted “false solutions” to climate change like carbon trading, nukes and agrofuels, and was part of a national day of action for climate justice.

Now, the city has decided to charge these folks $8,340, with a deadline of mid-August to pay the fines.

Please help us raise the funds we need by donating what you can!

Following visits to several local “climate criminals,” including JP Morgan Chase (one of the leading funders of mountain top removal coal mining), Midwest Generation (the owner of Chicago’s two coal-fired power plants), and the Board of Trade (which trades in palm oil, one of the leading drivers of rainforest destruction), the N30 march arrived at the main target, the Chicago Climate Exchange.

The Chicago Climate Exchange is the first and largest carbon trading institution in North America.  Carbon Trading is a system of trading in carbon that intensifies social injustice, does not reduce emissions in a meaningful way, results in more pollution and more displacement for communities on the ground, and acts as a dangerous distraction from the real climate solutions we urgently need.  (It does succeed in making a bunch of money for big polluters and their cohorts.)  Unfortunately, participation in this fraudulent market has become the primary way that governments, corporations, and mainstream environmental groups have attempted to “solve” the climate crisis.

To draw attention to carbon trading as a false solution, 12 people locked their arms together in lockboxes, formed a large circle, and took over the intersection of Adams and LaSalle, outside the offices of the Chicago Climate Exchange, for several hours, encircling a banner that read, “Chicago Climate Exchange – the Air is Not for Sale!”  (Check out photos and video from the action at http://howgreenischicago.org.)

Now, the city has decided to charge these folks $8,340, with a deadline of mid-August to pay the fines.  We need your support!!  Please consider donating whatever you can to support the N30 defendants.  Throw a benefit party, pass a hat, sell some cupcakes — it all adds up!

You can donate online below,  or send a check payable to LVEJO with “N30 Legal Defense” in the memo line to:

LVEJO – Little Village Environmental Justice Organization

2856 S. Millard Ave.

Chicago, IL 60623

Thank you!  All donations are much appreciated!!!

Love,

The Climate Exchange 12

Please help us raise the funds we need by donating what you can!

Group Erects Purple Mountain Majesty At EPA; Say “If Administrator Lisa Jackson Won’t Visit the Appalachian Mountains, They Will Bring The Mountains to Her”

In an attempt to further pressure EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to enforce the Clean Water Act and halt mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR), activists early this morning erected two 20-foot-tall, purple tripod structures in front of the agency’s headquarters. A pair of activists perched at the top of the tripods have strung a 25-foot sign in front of the EPA’s door that reads, “EPA: pledge to end mountaintop removal in 2010.” Six people are locked to the tripods and say they won’t leave unless Administrator Jackson commits to a flyover visit of the Appalachian Mountains and MTR sites, which she has never done before.

This is the latest in a series of actions and activities aimed at pressuring the EPA to take more decisive action on mountaintop removal coal mining. Today’s tactic is modeled on the multi-day tree-sits that have been happening in West Virginia to protect mountains from coal companies’ imminent blasting. Called the worst of the worst strip mining, the practice blows the tops off of whole mountains to scoop out the small seams of coal that lie beneath.

“We’re losing our way of life and our culture,” said Chuck Nelson, who worked as a coal miner in West Virginia for three decades and came to DC to support today’s protest. “Mountaintop removal should be banned today. The practice means total devastation for communities, the hardwood forests, the ecosystems, and the headwaters. Why should our communities sacrifice everything we have?”

Despite the Obama administration’s big announcement last year that it was going to take “unprecedented steps” to reduce the environmental damage from mountaintop removal coal mining in Appalachia, the EPA has been slow moving. Two weeks ago, the EPA delayed action on a set of broad-ranging and specific measures to reduce the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal, after details of the plan were leaked to coal-state mining regulators. The EPA has for months been close to finalizing these permit guidelines, which many hope will mandate tougher protections to limit damage to water quality and be a step in the right direction toward abolishing the practice.

The delay in EPA’s announcement of more detailed permit guidelines came just as the agency also asked U.S. District Judge Robert C. Chambers for more time to decide if it will veto the largest mountaintop removal mining permit in West Virginia history, the nearly 2,300-acre Spruce No. 1 Mine in Logan County.

“The science has become clear that mountaintop removal is harming water resources in real and measurable ways,” said Kate Rooth of the Rainforest Action Network, which organized the protest. “The EPA definitely can and must do much more on mountaintop mining and that includes exercising its full regulatory authority to block every single mining permit application that seeks to remove America’s oldest mountaintops and dump the waste into waterways.”

Based on EPA Administrator Jackson’s statements on March 8th at the National Press Club, it appears that the EPA is seeking ways to “minimize” the ecological damage of mountaintop mining rather than halt the most extreme strip mining practice. A paper released in January by a dozen leading scientists in the journal Science, however, concluded that mountaintop coal mining is so destructive that the government should stop giving out new permits all together. “The science is so overwhelming that the only conclusion that one can reach is that mountaintop mining needs to be stopped,” said Margaret Palmer, a professor at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Sciences and the study’s lead author.

“Ultimately, what is clear is that mountaintop removal cannot be regulated. It must be abolished. Otherwise, we will continue to jeopardize our historic mountains, precious drinking water and especially the lives of the people who call Appalachia home. All of this for a tiny percent of dirty coal, the tradeoff doesn’t add up,” said Kate Finneran, one of the two main climbers in today’s protest.

Called the worst of the worst coal mining, mountaintop removal coal mining results in the clear-cutting of thousands of acres of some of the world’s most biologically diverse forests, the burying of crucial headwaters streams and the contamination of groundwater with toxic levels of heavy lead and mercury. According to the EPA, this destructive practice has damaged or destroyed nearly 2,000 miles of streams and threatens to destroy 1.4 million acres of forest by 2020.

for hi resolution pictures click here

Follow @RANactions on Twitter for updates

February 26, 2010

Contacts:

Brian Bernhardt; ‘Power Past Coal’ Organizer; 703-439-0725; brian.bernhardt@colorado.edu

Amy Guinan, ‘Power Past Coal’ Organizer; 303-999-6374; amyguinan@yahoo.com

Tom Weis, President of Wind Power Solutions; 303-499-9648; tom@windpowersolutions.com

Denver, CO – At 11:45am on Friday, February 26th, local citizens demonstrated at the Denver headquarters of Xcel Energy – located at the corner of 17th St. and Lawrence St. – in protest of the utility’s impending plan to bring a new coal-fired power plant online in Pueblo, CO. The lunch hour protest called on Xcel executives to move Colorado in the right direction by keeping the Comanche 3 coal-fired power plant closed. Protestors demonstrated in a ‘die-in’ in front of the building’s main entrance to highlight the grim consequences that coal has on our lives and those of future generations. Simultaneously, two activists clad in hazmat suits dropped a banner off an adjoining bridge on Lawrence St. Police arrived on scene but no arrests were made.

The 750-megawatt Comanche Unit 3 would be the largest coal-fired power plant in the state, surpassing even the mammoth Cherokee coal plant in North Denver. “At a time when the costs of coal are becoming increasingly clear and the benefits of clean energy are ever more apparent, building the largest coal-fired power plant in the state is taking us 180 degrees in the wrong direction,” said Amy Guinan, an activist with Power Past Coal.

According to Xcel’s own data, the Comanche 3 plant would emit over 20 million pounds of CO2 a day, 2 pounds of mercury a week and thousands of tons of particulates and haze forming pollutants every year. The plant would also consume over 4 million gallons of water a day.

“Xcel has already wasted nearly $1 billion on this planet-destroying boondoggle. Operating it could cost ratepayers billions more. For the sake of Colorado’s children, and future generations, it is time for Xcel to pull the plug on this ill-conceived coal plant and redirect their investments towards making Colorado 100% renewable,” said Tom Weis, President of Wind Power Solutions.

Xcel has had ongoing problems bringing the plant online. While Xcel originally hoped to bring the plant into operation last fall, a variety of technical problems – currently involving a boiler pump – continue to push back its scheduled opening.

“There are a lot more than just technical problems with this new coal-fired power plant. There are serious social, economic and environmental problems. Rather than talking about a delayed opening, we should be talking about a permanent closure. Instead of building a new coal-fired plant, Xcel should be investing heavily in Colorado’s abundant solar and wind resources,” said Brian Bernhardt, an activist with Power Past Coal.

Today’s protest is part of an ongoing series of actions to move Colorado beyond coal. Sparked by the failure of elected and appointed officials to take meaningful action to move rapidly to renewable energy, the Power Past Coal campaign is building a grassroots protest effort. With the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment approving the permit-to-pollute for both the Valmont and Cherokee stations despite overwhelming public opposition, citizens are prepared to ramp up the pressure on Xcel executives, as well as Colorado politicians and regulatory agencies.

“Our leaders are failing to lead and Xcel is failing to take their responsibility seriously. Xcel should expect more protests and actions unless they start closing down coal plants and moving Colorado to 100% renewable electricity,” Kate Clark, a Power Past Coal activist.

Xcel has been challenged on multiple fronts this week. On Tuesday evening, Pueblo residents – where the new coal-fired power plant is built – raised serious concerns about high-pitched noises from the plant which are affecting people as far as nine miles away. Meanwhile, WildEarth Guardians petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to protect clean air and the climate and overturn an air pollution permit allowing Xcel Energy to illegally pollute while operating the Pawnee coal-fired power plant.

***

*Photographs available throughout the day at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/powerpastcoalcolorado/sets/72157623370635897/

A coalition of environmental activists led by GatewaySucks.org is calling on climate change activists to join the convergence at the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver.

When the 2010 Winter Olympics start a couple of weeks from now in Vancouver, BC the athletes and spectators will be joined by organizations with some of the worst records on climate change.

General Motors is a national partner for the games, and one of the leading corporate opponents of effective action on climate change. Only two years ago, a vice-chairman of GM called global warming a “total crock of shit.” GM is supplying a large fleet of vehicles for the games, almost all of which are gas-guzzling SUVs.

Petro-Canada, another National Olympic Partner, is the retail arm of the largest extractor of Oil Sands bitumen. The Oil Sands are Canada’s biggest ghg emissions point source.

RBC (the Royal Bank of Canada) in addition to being a prominent Olympic sponsor is the largest commercial bank funder of the Oil Sands,. TransCanada pipelines, whose pipelines connect to the Oil Sands, is also an official supplier.

The government of British Columbia is the main funder and promoter of the games. They kicked off a massive plan to add over 1,000 km of new highway lanes (an increase of over 2,000,000 annual tonnes of CO2e emissions ) with the Sea-to-Sky Highway expansion for the Olympics. These plans include the controversial Gateway Program. It continues to heavily subsidize the oil and gas industry which resulted in it being the only Canadian province to see ghg emissions from industrial sources increase in 2008.

The Federal government of Canada which consistently earned “Fossil Awards” at the most recent international climate talks also is a major funder for the Olympics.

These corporations and governments want to fool the world with their claim that these are the “Greenest Games Ever” despite the links to climate change deniers, highway expansion and the Oil Sands.

If you would like to endorse this call-out and the welcoming committee event please contact info@gatewaysucks.org.

MORE INFORMATION:

Convergence Info: http://olympicresistance.net/

Welcoming Committee: http://2010welcoming.wordpress.com/

Green Olympic Watch: http://2010greenwatch.org/

GatewaySucks.org: http://www.gatewaysucks.org/

2010 Climate Crime Scene: http://2010climatecrime.org

]]> http://www.beyondtalk.net/2010/02/climate-change-activists-join-the-vancouver-convergence/feed/ 1 http://www.beyondtalk.net/2009/12/petition-stop-danish-police-abuses-against-peaceful-climate-protesters/ http://www.beyondtalk.net/2009/12/petition-stop-danish-police-abuses-against-peaceful-climate-protesters/#comments Tue, 15 Dec 2009 15:05:02 +0000 deadlyvine http://www.beyondtalk.net/?p=320

To: Hans Gammeltoft-Hansen (Ombudsman), Per Larsen (Detective Commander of the Danish National Police) and Ritt Bjerregaard (Lord Mayor of Copenhagen)

Over the past two weeks, citizens of countries all over the world have come to Copenhagen for the UN COP-15 climate negotiations. Many have engaged in peaceful, nonviolent protest, trying to push world leaders to sign a meaningful deal that will save our planet for future generations.

Rather that giving them the space, the Danish police have used extremely heavy-handed and cruel mass arrest tactics, potentially violating European human rights laws. The Danish police are out of control, and they need to be held accountable.

SIGN PETITION HERE

Please join us and take action! Sign this petition calling on the Danish government to immediately investigate the police actions of the past two weeks, and demand that they allow future peaceful protests to go forward without similar abuses.

Danish Police: Going Too Far

On Saturday, Dec. 12, 100,000 people in Copenhagen participated in an overwhelmingly peaceful protest – but this protest was marred by the overzealous Danish police, who blocked off streets surrounding large groups of protestors, and arrested almost 1,000 people, the vast majority of which were clearly doing nothing illegal. Arrestees were handcuffed and forced to sit in rows for hours, as the temperatures dipped below freezing; numerous people urinated on themselves after being denied use of toilets. According to Maria Ludwig from Germany, “They kept me for two hours with plastic cuffs around our wrists and our hands behind our back, and then they put us on the bus. We had nothing to eat or drink, and one man asked the police to go to the toilet and they said: ‘No way are you going to put your trousers down, you’ll just have to piss into your trousers.”

And this is only one example of the harassment of environmental protestors by the Danish police in recent weeks. On Dec. 11, police arrested 68 people at a nonviolent protest in downtown Copenhagen, refusing to give reasons for making arrests. (You can see examples of police violence at the Dec. 11 protest on this video.) On the night of Dec. 14, police raided the district of Christiania, where a protest group was holding a fundraiser party, arresting 200 people and using tear gas, police dogs, and water cannons on people that they claimed were protestors. Lily Kember, 22, from London, said: “There was no warning. We were dancing, having a great night and then suddenly the tent was full of tear gas. I saw an old man near me doubled up and coughing.”

Possible Violations of EU Human Rights Laws?

Throughout these protests, police have cited a controversial law, passed on Nov. 26, that gave them sweeping powers to make “pre-emptive arrests” and hold people for up to 12 hours without any actual wrongdoing having taken place. The new law was publicly denounced as “draconian” by numerous environmental groups, trade unions, and other organizations.

In a press release from Aug. 10, the Danish police stated that “all people are, without previous permission, at liberty to assemble unarmed” and that “the police arenít allowed to take action, unless attacked, until after the crowd has three times been called upon to disperse.” However, in these protests, these commitments have been blatantly disregarded.According to Claus Bonnez, a lawyer working with Krim, a human rights organization, “according to the European Court of Human Rights process, the police will have to prove that it is necessary for democratic society to make such arrests. And I don’t think that the Danish police will be able to prove that.”

On Dec. 13, Amnesty International called for an investigation into potential human rights abuses, stating that “when nearly 1,000 people are arrested and then all but 13 are released it means that many of those people were just innocent people in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Take action now! Please sign this petition, and help make Denmark a safe place for peaceful protest.

SIGN PETITION HERE

Today on the Global Day of Climate Justice Action, a rowdy march in San Francisco made it’s way to Bank of America’s skyscraper (the tallest building in San Francisco), where dozens of activists blockaded the doors all around the building. Over 200 marched and rallied with at least 22 being arrested in the blockade.

Some locked themselves within the revolving doors to disrupt Bank of America’s business for the day. Bank of America is one of the largest funders of coal plants, oil and gas in the country. They also play a leading role within trade associations pushing for cap and trade.“The world’s largest corporations are blocking an agreement to address the climate crisis that is endangering our common future,” stated organizer David Solnit. “Meanwhile, Bank of America profits from financing dirty energy and carbon trading schemes that subsidize pollution and poverty.” According to Bloomberg, Bank of America is the third largest financier of oil, gas, and coal in the world, and is heavily involved in financing mountaintop removal coal mining.The activists, organized as The Mobilization for Climate Justice, also targeted carbon traders, and five of the largest contributors to climate pollution: JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Chevron, BP, and American Electric Power.The Mobilization blames these corporations for contributing to the climate crisis and promoting false solutions such as carbon trading, “clean coal”, nuclear energy and bio-fuels. Through direct lobbying, and support of lobbying institutions like the Chambers of Commerce and the US Climate Action Partnership, these corporations have prevented democratic domestic and international climate negotiations. Moreover, companies like Chevron, whose Richmond oil refinery is the single largest emitter of climate pollution in California , continue to dump toxic pollution in poor communities with impunity.This protest marks the 10th anniversary of the massive mobilization in Seattle that effectively derailed the corporate agenda driving the World Trade Organization’s trade liberalization policies. “We cannot allow the world’s largest corporate polluters to continue robbing our children’s future,” stated Carla Perez of Movement Generation, marching with a parade of children and the Raging Grannies carrying clean up equipment. “US corporations have been holding climate solutions hostage, while burdening our communities with ongoing attacks on our health and livelihoods.”Protestors demand that Bank of America and the other corporations stop polluting the climate and promoting false solutions at the UN and in the halls of Congress.

Today on the Global Day of Climate Justice Action, a rowdy march in San Francisco made it’s way to Bank of America’s skyscraper (the tallest building in San Francisco), where dozens of activists blockaded the doors all around the building. Over 200 marched and rallied with at least 22 being arrested in the blockade.

Some locked themselves within the revolving doors to disrupt Bank of America’s business for the day. Bank of America is one of the largest funders of coal plants, oil and gas in the country. They also play a leading role within trade associations pushing for cap and trade.

“The world’s largest corporations are blocking an agreement to address the climate crisis that is endangering our common future,” stated organizer David Solnit. “Meanwhile, Bank of America profits from financing dirty energy and carbon trading schemes that subsidize pollution and poverty.” According to Bloomberg, Bank of America is the third largest financier of oil, gas, and coal in the world, and is heavily involved in financing mountaintop removal coal mining.

The activists, organized as The Mobilization for Climate Justice, also targeted carbon traders, and five of the largest contributors to climate pollution: JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Chevron, BP, and American Electric Power.

The Mobilization blames these corporations for contributing to the climate crisis and promoting false solutions such as carbon trading, “clean coal”, nuclear energy and bio-fuels. Through direct lobbying, and support of lobbying institutions like the Chambers of Commerce and the US Climate Action Partnership, these

corporations have prevented democratic domestic and international climate negotiations. Moreover, companies like Chevron, whose Richmond oil refinery is the single largest emitter of climate pollution in California , continue to dump toxic pollution in poor communities with impunity.

This protest marks the 10th anniversary of the massive mobilization in Seattle that effectively derailed the corporate agenda driving the World Trade Organization’s trade liberalization policies. “We cannot allow the world’s largest corporate polluters to continue robbing our children’s future,” stated Carla Perez of Movement Generation, marching with a parade of children and the Raging Grannies carrying clean up equipment. “US corporations have been holding climate solutions hostage, while burdening our communities with ongoing attacks on our health and livelihoods.”

Protestors demand that Bank of America and the other corporations stop polluting the climate and promoting false solutions at the UN and in the halls of Congress.

]]> http://www.beyondtalk.net/2009/11/san-francisco-climate-justice-action-at-bank-of-america-200-rally-with-at-least-22-arrested/feed/ 0 http://www.beyondtalk.net/2009/11/chicago-climate-activists-target-carbon-trading-chicago-climate-exchange/ http://www.beyondtalk.net/2009/11/chicago-climate-activists-target-carbon-trading-chicago-climate-exchange/#comments Mon, 30 Nov 2009 19:47:05 +0000 deadlyvine http://www.beyondtalk.net/?p=299

*More details and photos coming soon!*

Chicago climate activists returned to the streets today – this time in the financial district in downtown  Chicago – in a colorful demonstration against cap and trade, carbon offsets and other “false solutions” to climate change.  Building on the long-term campaign to shut down the Crawford and Fisk coal-fired power plants in the city, community and environmental groups from across Chicago and beyond have come together to demand just, equitable, and effective solutions to the climate crisis.

The main target of today’s action is the Chicago Climate Exchange, the first and largest carbon market in North America.  Several other “climate criminals” were visited during a march, including JP Morgan Chase, one of the leading funders of mountain top removal coal mining; Midwest Generation, the owner of Chicago’s two coal-fired power plants; and the Board of Trade, which trades in palm oil, one of the leading drivers of rainforest destruction.

The event kicked off at 11a.m. at Federal Plaza (Adams and Dearborn Street), and is part of a national day of action called for by the Mobilization for Climate Justice in the lead-up to the UN climate summit in Copenhagen and on the 10-year anniversary of the successful shutdown of the WTO in Seattle in 1999.

“From Chicago to Copenhagen, powerful companies are cashing in on the climate crisis, taking advantage of public concern over climate change in order to make a buck.  Carbon trading institutions like the Chicago Climate Exchange are privatizing the air we breathe and handing over rights to the atmosphere to the biggest polluters,” stated Angie Viands, of Rainforest Action Network (RAN) Chicago.  “Carbon Trading is a fraudulent market that intensifies social injustice, does not reduce emissions in a meaningful way, and acts as a dangerous distraction from the real climate solutions we urgently need.”

Event organizers seek to highlight the connections between the global drivers of climate change and local struggles for environmental justice and climate stability.

“The solution to climate change isn’t carbon trading; it is a just, rapid transition away from the industries that are poisoning our communities and the planet.  We can begin by shutting down the Crawford and Fisk coal plants right here in Chicago,” said Dorian Breuer of the Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization (PERRO).

While carbon trading is the centerpiece of plans to deal with the climate crisis both in the UN, and in the US Congress and Obama Administration, many civil society organizations consider this market-based approach to be ineffective and unacceptable from a climate justice perspective.  “The air is not for sale!” declared Abigail Singer of the Mobilization for Climate Justice.  “Cap and trade plans are an unprecedented and opportunistic attempt to privatize the atmosphere; in reality, many offset projects embody a new form of colonialism in the developing nations that are most heavily impacted by climate change.  We reject these plans as inherently unjust as well as ineffective at reducing emissions.”

Criticism of carbon trading has been mounting, most recently from sources like top NASA climate scientist Dr. James Hansen and EPA attorneys Laurie Williams and Allan Zabel, who between them represent over 40 years of experience analyzing cap and trade and offset programs.  Both were recently muzzled by the EPA for their outspoken criticism of Administration plans to pursue cap and trade and offsets which appeared as a Washington Post editorial.

Activists will also confront Midwest Generation LLC, owner of the Fisk and Crawford coal-fired power plants in Pilsen and Little Village, Chicago. Local residents attribute numerous adverse health effects to the continued operation of the plants, prompting community groups LVEJO and PERRO to actively campaign for their closure.  This demand has been heard by Ald. Joe Moore (49^th Ward), who announced plans on October 24^th to introduce an ordinance which would effectively shut the plants down. The Fisk plant was the target of a large community demonstration in October on the 350 International Day of Climate Action.  Together, Fisk and Crawford’s emissions represent one-fifth of Chicago’s carbon footprint.

“We are here today as a community demanding a transparent and truly renewable clean energy future.  Our environment’s future should not be dependant on a market based system, it should be reliable to save our future. We demand our voice be heard!” said Kim Wasserman, Coordinator for the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO)

“We have lived in the shadows of these coal plants for far too long.  The recent lawsuits against the plants for health violations show that government is willing to move, but we need them to move faster and stronger,” Wasserman said.

“To bring atmospheric carbon into the safe zone of 350 parts per million (ppm), we must phase out dirty coal, invest in clean, decentralized, renewable energy, and adopt agriculture and forestry practices that sequester CO2. False solutions like carbon trading, so-called “clean coal” and nuclear power are not going to solve the climate crisis,” states Debra Michaud of Rainforest Action Network Chicago.

Organizers express opposition to currently proposed U.S. climate legislation which relies heavily on can and trade and carbon offsets.

“The current climate legislation is fatally flawed, setting weak targets and creating inappropriate tools,” remarks David Kraft of Nuclear Energy Information Service. “It should be modified to exclude false climate solutions, or else rejected; and certainly should NOT in its current form serve as the blueprint for the U.S. negotiating position in Copenhagen,” insists Kraft.  A co-signed letter in opposition will be delivered to the offices of Sens. Richard Durbin and Roland Burris before the rally, and formal meetings requested of the Senators before they vote on the Senate version of the climate bill.

Some participants will take part in nonviolent direct action and civil disobedience at one of the sites along the march route.

Photos and updates from the event will be available at:http://howgreenischicago.org and http://www.actforclimatejustice.org.  The procession will include a marching band and many colorful banners, props and signs.

Today’s action is one of nine major protests taking place across the US organized by the Mobilization for Climate Justice, Rising Tide North America, and the Climate Pledge of Resistance.   Locally, five organizations that helped organize the October 24^th protest rally at the Fisk coal-fired power plant in Chicago are endorsing today’s action and are participating in the march and rally: Rainforest Action Network Chicago, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, Nuclear Energy Information Service, Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization, and Eco-Justice Collaborative.

Climate justice activists march on polluters and lobbyists in downtown Washington DC

Feisty unpermitted march blocks traffic, marks the tenth anniversary of the WTO shutdown in Seattle, demands “Corporations out of Copenhagen” one week prior to the UN climate summit

Washington DC – Climate justice activists this morning marched through downtown Washington DC to visit climate polluters and the K Street lobbyists who represent them, joining thousands more in cities across the country for actions marking the November 30th Mobilization for Climate Justice. The march occurred just one week before the beginning of international climate negotiations in Copenhagen and marked the tenth anniversary of the historic day when activists converged in Seattle to non-violently shut down the meetings of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

[Click to view PHOTOS of today’s climate justice march in Washington DC]

“Oil companies, lobbyists, and banks are driving climate change and using their influence to prevent us from taking swift action to stop climate change. They are accelerating us off of a climate change cliff by promoting business as usual. They’ll just save themselves with their golden parachutes, leaving the rest of the world in free fall,” said organizer Lacy MacAuley, “We are calling for ‘Corporations out of Copenhagen,’ asking businesses and their lobbyists to step aside and let us create meaningful solutions to climate change, solutions that place people before profit.”

The march in Washington began at the US Chamber of Commerce, the top lobby group representing corporate CEOs at the expense of people and the planet, and then visited many sites of climate destruction throughout the city. Activists marched to the American Petroleum Institute, banks funding climate destruction such as Bank of America, and lobbyists for oil companies like Shell, Chevron, BP and Conoco Phillips. Mini-rallies were held outside the buildings.

At each location, speakers at the mini-rallies splashed cups of the water from melting glaciers on the floor or outside of the buildings, demanding that representatives at the businesses cancel their plans to travel to the Copenhagen climate summit. Speakers also debunked corporate-led false solutions to climate change such as “clean” coal, nuclear energy and carbon offsets, promoting real sustainable solutions such as wind and solar energy.

Marchers chanted “Corporations out of Copenhagen” and “stop your looting, polluting and lobbying,” circulating through the K Street corridor where energy companies, lobbyists, and climate change funders have their offices.

“The Copenhagen climate summit must be about our future, about survival of the world’s most vulnerable people, not corporate profits,” said Julie Erickson, an organizer with the Mobilization for Climate Justice. “These climate criminals, corporate polluters and their lobbyists should cancel their plans to go to Copenhagen next week and get out of the way of a clean energy future.”

The Washington DC march is part of the nationwide Mobilization for Climate Justice to demand real, just and effective solutions to the climate crisis. It is one of several actions today in cities across the US, including Seattle, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, New York, Portland, ME and Washington, DC. These actions were called for and organized through the Mobilization for Climate Justice (www.actforclimatejustice.org).

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Photos available at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/climatejusticedc/sets/72157622777575235/

For more information on the Mobilization for Climate Justice: www.actforclimatejustice.org

Top 5 Reasons Why Corporations are Climate Criminals:

1) Corporations put profits before people, often exploiting people of color, low-income communities, and Indigenous people – We need to put people before profits!

2) They are the biggest carbon polluters. By extracting and burning oil, coal, & natural gas, they perpetuate our addiction to fossil fuels – We need a clean energy economy!

3) They seek to profit from climate change through lax carbon regulation, tax loopholes, and public financing for private industry projects – We need binding emissions targets, not corporate handouts!

4) They have weakened and stalled U.S. climate legislation through millions of dollars of lobbying, reducing the likelihood of a fair, ambitious, & binding treaty at Copenhagen – We need strong climate legislation from Congress now!

5) They work with the World Bank and IMF to expand free trade policies that damage local economies, ecosystems, and communities – We need free people, not free trade!

13 lock down at EPA headquarters (DC) alongside 50 Appalachian coalfield residents

Published October 30, 2009 By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) — Activists with Mountain Justice, Rainforest Action Network and other groups planned protests atEnvironmental Protection Agency headquarters and across the country Friday to demand the end of mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia.

An online map showed more than two dozen planned events from California to Maine, including demonstrations at a regional EPA office in Philadelphia and a New Jersey office of JPMorgan & Chase Co., a bank environmentalists say is the biggest financier of the destructive form of strip mining.

It was the third attempt at a national protest since June, and evidence the environmentalists believe the tide is turning in their favor under the Obama administration.

”The end of mountaintop removal is almost here,” declares the Rainforest Action Network on its Web site. ”Political and financial decision-makers in New York, Washington D.C. and across the country continue to hear our message.”

Chris Hamilton, vice president of the West Virginia Coal Association, was out of the office Friday and did not immediately return a cell phone message.

Mountaintop removal is a form of strip mining that blasts apart ridge tops to expose multiple coal seams. Operators level off the peaks, then dump rock and debris into valleys, sometimes covering intermittent streams and changing the contour of the land.

Coal operators say it’s often the most efficient and sometimes the only way to get to reserves, but many people who live near the mines say they suffer unacceptable damage to the environment and their homes.

West Virginians Bo Webb and Chuck Nelson were in Washington, D.C., with at least two dozen other protesters, hoping to deliver a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

”I do think it’s turning in our direction. They’re starting to look at scientific evidence showing what filling in the streams and valleys does to our headwaters, to the whole ecosystem,” said Nelson, a disabled underground coal miner from Glen Daniel. ”But we need to stress to the EPA that they need to make a decision soon because the longer this goes on, the more danger they’re putting us in.”

The EPA recently revoked a permit for what could have been West Virginia’s largest mountaintop removal operation, citing ”very serious concerns” about possible Clean Water Act violations. It was the first time since 1972 the agency had used its authority to review a previously permitted project.

Two weeks ago, unruly crowds took over what were intended to be public hearings in Kentucky and West Virginia on an Army Corps of Engineers proposal to suspend or end a streamlined permitting process for mountaintop removal mines. They shouted down and intimidated the few environmentalists who showed up to support individual reviews of operations.

”As long as there’s that uncertainty, not knowing what’s going to happen, it’s going to keep causing tension in the communities and in the industry,” Nelson said. ”The threats are becoming more intense because they’re uncertain what the future holds for them.”

EPA administrators ”need to make a quick decision about what is and what is not going to be allowed.”

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On the Net:

Rainforest Action Network: http://ran.org

W.Va. Coal Association: http://www.wvcoal.com/mountain-top-mining/what-is-moutain-top-mining .html

Mountain Justice: http://mountainjusticesummer.org/