Activist News Roundup #11
A monthly curated collection of climate activism news, protests, public marches, direct actions, and related court cases. We are regularly inspired by the creative and courageous resistance we see around the globe, and we hope that gathering the stories here will keep you motivated, informed and connected.
Trans Mountain Pipeline and Kinder Morgan
Inslee calls Canada pipeline ‘profoundly damaging,’ fears for orcas in surprise deal
The Seattle Times, Lynda V. Mapes; May 29, 2018
“An unprecedented deal between the Canadian federal government and Houston-based Kinder Morgan to expand the Trans Mountain Pipeline poses grave risks for the critically endangered southern-resident killer- whale population, and drew a stiff rebuke from Washington’s governor, who called the pipeline ‘profoundly damaging.'”
Say hello to Justin Trudeau, the world’s newest oil executive
The Guardian, Bill McKibben; May 30, 2018
“Justin Trudeau’s government announced on Tuesday that it would nationalize the Kinder Morgan pipeline running from the tar sands of Alberta to the tidewater of British Columbia. It will fork over at least $4.5bn in Canadian taxpayers’ money for the right to own a 60-year-old pipe that springs leaks regularly, and for the right to push through a second pipeline on the same route – a proposal that has provoked strong opposition.”
I was arrested for protesting against Canada’s pipeline – and the battle is far from over
The Guardian, Elizabeth May; May 30, 2018
“The Alberta oil sands lie under thousands of square kilometers of boreal forest, wetland and muskeg. Bitumen is a viscous substance found in small concentrations amid the rock and soil. It is either mined out from huge open pits, or pumped out through in situ production, injecting hot water deep into the ground to loosen it. Either way, the resulting product is highly polluting, very expensive to produce and of low value. Bitumen is a solid. To be refined, bitumen must undergo costly upgrading. Bitumen, being both low value and expensive to produce, would never have been developed without government subsidies, with the lowest royalty rates in the world at 1% and massive federal subsidies of several billion/year.”
Washington Tribes Vow To Fight Canadian Pipeline Expansion
OPB, John Ryan; May 30, 2018
“Tribal leaders on both sides of the border said Canada’s purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline would not weaken their opposition to the pipeline’s planned expansion.”
Judge Orders EPA to Produce Science behind Pruitt’s Warming Claims
Scientific American, Scott Waldman; June 5, 2018
“EPA must produce the opposing body of science Administrator Scott Pruitt has relied upon to claim that humans are not the primary drivers of global warming, a federal judge has ruled.”
TransCanada Pipeline Explodes in West Virginia
EcoWatch, Lorraine Chow; June 7, 2018
“A newly installed TransCanada natural gas pipeline exploded early Thursday in the remote Nixon Ridge area of Marshall County in West Virginia.”
Calls for the environment from Margaret Atwood and the Pope
Margaret Atwood: ‘If the ocean dies, so do we’
BBC News, Mary Halton; June 11, 2018
“The celebrated author Margaret Atwood has told a conference that humanity’s future is linked to the survival of ocean ecosystems. Commenting on ocean plastic pollution, she said: ‘Something has to be done… If the ocean dies; end of us.’ Ms Atwood was speaking at the Under Her Eye summit in London. The conference, held at the British Library, also heard that climate change disproportionately affects women on a global scale. In addition, their voices are ‘too rarely heard’ in top level climate change discussions. Aiming to tackle key environmental issues ‘from a female perspective’, the event hosted a range of policy makers, artists and scientists.”
Pope Tells Oil Executives to Act on Climate: ‘There Is No Time to Lose’
The New York Times, Elisabetta Povoledo; June 9, 2018
Three years ago, Pope Francis issued a sweeping letter that highlighted the global crisis posed by climate change and called for swift action to save the environment and the planet. On Saturday, the pope gathered money managers and titans of the world’s biggest oil companies during a closed-door conference at the Vatican and asked them if they had gotten the message.
A manifesto to save Planet Earth (and ourselves)
BBC News, Simon Lewis and Mark Maslin; June 7, 2018
“The impacts of human actions on our home planet are now so large that many scientists are declaring a new phase of Earth’s history. The old forces of nature that transformed Earth many millions of years ago, including meteorites and mega-volcanoes are joined by another: us. We have entered a new geological epoch, called the Anthropocene. As scientists we agree that society has entered a dangerous new time. But what is to be done?”
Can art help people feel the devastation of climate change?
Pacific Standard, Amy Brady; June 6, 2018
“Massie’s Climate Museum—whose board of trustees and staff plan to start looking in several years for a permanent home in New York City—is only the second of its kind in the world (the first is in Hong Kong). Its purpose, she says, is to educate people about the effects of climate change through exhibits and public programs that appeal as much to emotion as to intellect.”
The Poor People’s Campaign
Activists channel Martin Luther King with new national climate campaign
The Guardian; Oliver Milman; June 11, 2018
“The Poor People’s Campaign’s attempt to stage a ‘moral revival’ across dozens of US states echoes much of its 1968 antecedent – a guttural cry to shake America from a miasma of racism, poverty and militarism. But the modern version has also opened up a new battleground – the environment.”
How to protest in Trump’s America according to people on the frontlines
Grist; Justine Calma; June 11, 2018
“‘Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such tension that a community that has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.’ — Martin Luther King, Jr. In April 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote his Letter from a Birmingham Jail after being arrested during a civil rights demonstration. Fifty-five years later, the words he wrote aren’t lost on today’s pipeline protesters and people’s climate marchers. From Standing Rock to Bayou Bridge protests, the movement toward a climate-just future has never made bigger headlines. And the stakes have never been higher — for the planet, for vulnerable communities, and for those protesting to save it.”
Compiled by Kelly Jensvold and Nicole Metildi
