Beyond Extreme Energy: Action To Retire Fossil Fuels
In recent months many voices have called for larger, escalated action on climate change. We agree. At the beginning of November, as the election campaigns conclude, we call for multiple, consecutive days of climate direct action in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere. Vote we must, but we must do much more.
We hurtle toward a climate precipice with one foot occasionally, tentatively tapping the brake but the other simultaneously flooring the accelerator on our fossil-fueled economy.
At the wheel, among others, is the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Our government is pretending to navigate, but industry is calling the shots from the back seat.
We know how this will end: very badly, unless we change how we make energy, how we transport ourselves , how we grow food, how the economy is structured, how we measure the economy, and what we value.
Only our action can make the difference.
WE call on our government to drop its “all of the above” energy strategy. Extreme energy extraction — fracking, tar sands, deep ocean drilling, Arctic drilling, and surface mining and undermining practices such as mountaintop removal and longwall coal mining — of the last fossil fuels condemns us to ravaged landscapes, poisoned water, and weather convulsions. And it ensures catastrophic global warming for future generations.
WE call on FERC to make decisions based on the well-being of current and future generations and the protection of our shared natural resources. Rubber stamping industry pipelines, compressor stations and export facilities contaminates the air, water, land and climate that support all life on Earth. Specifically, we call on FERC to reject the proposal to build a dangerous gas export facility at Cove Point and to place a moratorium on approvals of other export facilities.
WE can no longer allow our government to segment gas projects from all others, thereby hiding the full danger. We must look at the whole picture, evaluating what is happening downstream and upstream. Each export terminal creates hazards not only for the local community, but for communities where the shale gas will be extracted, for communities where pipelines and compressor stations are built to transport the gas, and for communities receiving the exported gas. We must also measure the release of climate-disrupting methane and other greenhouse gases during this whole process, from extraction, transport, export, and eventual burning in faraway communities.
WE call on the Obama administration and FERC to recognize the unfolding disaster guaranteed by fueling our economy from the last dregs of fossil fuels.
Nothing less will protect our communities, the climate and the Earth.
We will join with the Great March for Climate Action which has been walking across the country since it left Los Angeles, Ca. in early March. On November 1 they will arrive in DC and we will join with them as they march into downtown DC to call for serious action by government officials on the climate crisis.
We will use this day for meeting, planning, and training for the actions November 3-7.
We will nonviolently sit-in and block the two entrances to FERC, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. On July 14th 25 people did this and were successful in disrupting business-as-usual at FERC for two hours until they were arrested. We learned from that experience and will use those lessons as we organize a bigger and stronger action the week of November 3rd-7th. The action at FERC needs people prepared to risk arrest and also those prepared to stand in support.
In the afternoons of November 3rd-7th, we will move from FERC to other locations–like the Energy Department and the White House. In the evenings we will evaluate how the day’s actions went, train any new people and refine our plans for the next day’s actions.
We have reserved a location for our November 2 and evening meetings. We have also reserved a church where people can stay for the entire week, sleeping on pews or on the floor (bring mats and sleeping bags!), for $5 a night.
We will use mass transit or walking to get around the city.