Compiled by Jesse D. Palmer
We need to impose a People’s Carbon Tax that slows down fossil fuel projects and makes them more expensive. The vulnerable weak links are everywhere. Most fossil fuel infrastructure has toxic and dangerous local impacts and brings little if any local benefit, so while the struggle against emissions is a global struggle, the People’s Carbon tax is easiest to impose locally.
Human emissions of CO2, methane and other gasses are rapidly destabilizing the climate and acidifying the oceans, despite anyone’s attempts at distracting us, denying science or spreading lies. 2016 was the hottest year in recorded history, second only to 2015 and 2014 . . . People everywhere aren’t just mourning — we’re organizing to block the types of short-sighted investments in fossil fuel infrastructure that lock the world into more emissions for decades to come. We demand zero investment in fossil fuels so money can be available to build cleaner alternatives like solar and wind power.
With the government and corporations pushing global extinction, regular people are putting their bodies on the line everywhere and in greater numbers. The inspiring protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline are the most visible right now, but we don’t have to all go to North Dakota to join the resistance. The fossil fuel monster is so huge that you can find a pipeline, oil refinery, coal mine, drilling rig, rail line shipping fossil fuels or shipping terminal close to home that would look great redecorated with protest signs and shut down.
Here’s a very incomplete and preliminary brainstorm of places where people are resisting fossil fuel projects — email Slingshot the ones you know about in your area and we’ll publish a better list next time. This list focuses on native-led protests, although not exclusively, because of help from rebelrebuildrewild.org and mediacoop.ca in making this list.
Trans-Pecos pipeline and Comanche Trail pipeline – Texas-Chihuahua, Mexico
The Trans-Pecos and Comanche Trail pipelines would carry fracked gas from Texas into Mexico, where it will supply the Mexican energy grid. The Two Rivers camp is a native-led resistance camp erected in the face of the Trans-Pecos pipeline.
Jordan Cove Energy Project – Oregon
The Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline project is a proposed 232-mile, 36-inch diameter pipeline designed to transport up to 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day from interconnects near Malin, Oregon, to the Jordan Cove terminal in Coos Bay, Oregon, where the natural gas would be liquefied for transport to international markets. The pipeline would cross under the Klamath, Umpqua, Rogue, and Coos Rivers as well as about 400 streams and require destruction of old growth forests. The project would be the West Coast’s first export facility for Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG). The LNG terminal and pipeline are opposed by Coos Bay residents and members of the Hoopa, Yurok and Karuk Tribes.
Longview Millennium Bulk Terminals coal export facility – Washington
The proposed project would permit up to 44 million tons of coal per year to be exported by sea. The coal would arrive via rail and involve trains moving along the Columbia River Gorge. It has been opposed by local residents.
Sabal Trail pipeline – Alabama – Georgia – Florida
The Sabal Trail pipeline is a 515-mile natural gas pipeline being constructed from Alabama to Georgia to Florida. It threatens one of the largest freshwater aquifers in the world. The Sacred Water Camp and Water Is Life Camp are ongoing camps opposing the pipeline, along with Bobby C. Billie, spiritual leader of the Council of the Original Miccosukee Simanolee Nation Aboriginal Peoples.
Line 3 pipeline – Alberta, Canada to Superior, Wisconsin
The Line 3 pipeline expansion is designed to transport 760,000 barrels per day of tar sands oil from the mines of Hardisty, Alberta, to Superior, Wisconsin, through the heart of Anishinaabe territory and some of the most beautiful lakes and wild rice beds in the world. The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs among others is challenging Line 3.
Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline – Alberta to British Columbia, Canada
The expansion of Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline would transport tar sands oil from northern Alberta to the British Columbia coast. The Sacred Trust is an initiative of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation with a mandate to stop the project.
Pilgrim pipeline – New York and New Jersey
The Ramapough Lunaape Nation, a community in the Ramapo Mountains, currently face the threat of the Pilgrim pipeline, which would transport Bakken crude oil from Albany, New York, to Linden, New Jersey. Resistance includes the Split Rock Prayer Camp. Spectra Energy also continues to expand its pipeline network so that more fracked natural gas can be transported and ultimately exported.
Petronas/Pacific Northwest Terminal – Prince Rupert, British Columbia
The Petronas/Pacific Northwest Terminal is a proposed liquefied natural gas plant on traditional Lax Kw’alaams territory Lax U’u’la (Lelu Island) at the mouth of the Skeena river near Prince Rupert, British Columbia. Plans call for a 48-inch diameter submarine pipeline to be dredged into estuary sediment to supply fracked gas from Treaty 8 territory. Ten Indigenous nations and 60,000 people in the Skeena watershed rely on fish there for food, commercial fishing, and cultural identity. The Lelu Island Camp on Lax Kw’alaams traditional territory is fighting to stop the terminal.
Diamond pipeline – Oklahoma – Arkansas – Tennessee
Arkansas Rising is a collective of guardians working through direct action to stop the Diamond pipeline, a 20-inch diameter pipeline that would run 440 miles from Cushing, Oklahoma, to Memphis, Tennessee. The pipeline would cross more than 500 waterways, including five major watersheds. Construction has already begun.
Atlantic Sunrise pipeline – Pennsylvania
The Atlantic Sunrise pipeline is a proposed high-pressure 42-inch diameter pipeline to carry fracked gas from Marcellus Shale to US markets to the south. Members of Lancaster Against Pipelines and supporters have built a blockade, nicknamed “The Stand,” on a farm in Conestoga in Lancaster County in the path of a proposed route. They are refusing to grant right of way to the project and have said they will occupy it if construction begins.
Sunoco Mariner East 2 pipeline – Pennsylvania
The Sunoco Mariner East pipeline is a proposed natural gas pipeline that would cross four states and facilitate fracking.
Bayou Bridge pipeline – Louisiana
Bold Louisiana is organizing to stop the proposed Bayou Bridge pipeline in Louisiana, a state that is experiencing climate devastation and coastline loss at an average rate of one football field of land every hour. This pipeline, a sister and end point to the Dakota Access pipeline, would run from Lake Charles to St. James, Louisiana.
Unis’tot’en Camp – British Columbia
For seven years the Unist’ot’en Camp on territory of the Talbits Kwah has stood at a site where a number of fossil fuel pipelines carrying tar sands or fracked natural gas (Enbridge, Pacific Trails Pipeline, Northern Gateway . . . ) want to cross the Wedzin Kwah river. It is located between Prince George and Prince Rupert in northern British Columbia. So far, no pipeline has crossed the site.
Cherry Point SSA Marine coal export terminal – Washington
If built, the $665 million project would be the biggest coal export terminal in North America, able to load up to 487 ships a year to carry coal abroad, mostly to Asia. A new coal terminal would bring thousands of railcars filled with coal to Washington from Wyoming’s Power River basin. The Lummi tribe and local residents oppose the project. [note: since publication, we have learned that this project was killed thanks to the efforts of the Lummi people.]
Fracking fields – California
Fracking has been documented in 10 California counties — Colusa, Glenn, Kern, Los Angeles, Monterey, Sacramento, Santa Barbara, Sutter, Kings and Ventura. Oil companies have also fracked offshore wells hundreds of times in the ocean near California’s coast, from Seal Beach to the Santa Barbara Channel. In Kern County, California’s major oil-producing county, 50 percent to 60 percent of new oil wells are fracked, according to estimates by Halliburton. Oil companies are increasingly interested in using fracking in the Monterey Shale, a geological formation under the San Joaquin, and the Los Angeles basins that may hold a large amount of extraordinarily dirty, carbon intensive oil. Time for a protest!
Oil trains to Valero refinery – California
Valero Oil wants to build a railroad terminal at its refinery near the Suisun Bay to connect the refinery to Union Pacific’s rail line so it can bring in up to 70,000 barrels of crude a day. Residents along the rail line oppose the plan, saying it poses too many environmental risks and increases the threat of injury or death from a derailment. The refinery already imports crude by ship and pipeline. Valero plans to haul two trains a day pulling 50 tanker cars a piece through Sacramento on the way to the refinery.