Creative Commons: 350.org, 2012
The climate movement raised an incredible amount of momentum already this year, and this week it built even more. Our allies are continuing to face off against the big polluters holding our energy future hostage; telling a freshly re-elected President that we weren’t backing down on our stance against Tar Sands pipelines; and welcoming new allies in the Arab world.
Optimism and renewed pressure greet President Obama’s re-election
After months of ruthless campaigning, the United States went to the polls last Tuesday and re-elected President Barack Obama. With his second term confirmed, most TckTckTck partners in the USA turned their attention to holding him accountable for strong action on climate change and energy. Here are a few of their responses:
- World Resources Institute president, Andrew Steer, put out a litany of suggestions for the Obama administration, including putting a price on carbon and taking a more constructive role in international negotiations.
- The Union of Concerned Scientists director of strategy and policy focused his suggestions on scientific integrity, communicating climate issues and solutions to the American people, curbing oil use, investing in sustainable agriculture and using federal agencies to get around congressional gridlock.
- CERES put out a statement calling on President Obama and Congress to expand clean energy with the goal of 20% renewable energy by 2020 and 30% by 2030; reduce greenhouse gas emissions to levels that avoid the worst impacts of climate change and build the resilience of our communities as they prepare for more pronounced extreme weather, such as last week’s devastating Hurricane Sandy.
- Oil Change International focused on voters’ rejection of candidates backed by big oil and what it might mean for the future.
Read the full list of partner responses here.
Within an hour of news outlets confirming Obama’s re-election, inboxes across the USA were filling up with invitations to a new protest at the White House on November 18. A year after thousands of people stormed the lawn calling for a presidential veto of the dangerous Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, organizers from the Sierra Club, Greenpeace US, Oil Change International, the Indigenous Environmental Network and others are back for more. As 350.org says on their site:
“Here’s what’s changed since last year: the Arctic has melted disastrously. Here’s what hasn’t changed: Keystone XL is still a crazy idea, a giant straw into the second biggest pool of carbon. Even if it doesn’t spill, it would add 900,000 barrels of oil worth of carbon each day to the earth’s atmosphere, or as much as the new auto efficiency regulations would save. It would, in other words, cancel out the whole long fight to increase auto mileage. Those tar sands are still the dirtiest energy on the planet.
Unlike the efforts in Winnsboro, Texas (where upwards of 30 people have been arrested blocking construction of the Keystone XL’s southern leg), this protest will be peaceful and arrest-free. Get more information about the protest and RSVP to attend here.
Calling on India to Go Beyond Coal
On Saturday, November 10 people across India participated in a Day of Action against coal power. Organized by 350.org, Greenpeace, Wiser Earth and others, the day included actions in dozens of cities across India all organized around one message Move beyond coal now!.
As organizers explained on their website:
We’re coming together around the country for a Day of Action against coal. That’s because coal is starting to take over in this country, from the mines of Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh to the massive power plants in Andhra Pradesh. And with it comes hidden costs like deforestation, loss of biodiversity, increased sickness“and also a changing climate that endangers India’s future (and everyone else’s). We need energy for everyone in this country–and happily we’re blessed with lots of renewable sources, from sun to wind to tide. But we’ll never develop this clean energy if we get locked into the dirty kind. …So on November 10th we’ll join our human energy in a wave of creative protest against coal. From every part of the country, those who are directly affected by coal and those beginning to realize its negative impacts will come together for this national day of action.
See photos from the Day of Action on their Flickr stream and on the India Beyond Coal website.
350.orgDo the Math tour rolls across the United States
The day after President Obama’s re-election, 350.org kicked off their ambitious Do the Math tour in Seattle, Washington. Based off the terrifying new math that co-founder Bill McKibben outlined in his popular Rolling Stone article this summer, Do the Math is an impassioned call for Americans to connect the dots between fossil fuel companies, increasing climate change and personal action, including divesting investments from oil, gas and coal companies..
Already the team has visited four cities on their 21 day/21 city biodiesel-powered bus tour – performing to packed, sold-out houses. Watch the promotional video for the tour below:
‘Climate change is the single biggest thing that humans have ever done on this planet. The only thing that needs to be bigger is our movement to stop it.’ – Bill McKibben
Tickets for the ‘Do the Math’ tour are mostly sold-out, but some may be available in certain cities. Find out more on their website.
The Arab Youth Climate Movement brings a day of action to 14 countries
Across the Middle East and North Africa, from the Gulf to the Atlantic young people came together on Saturday 10 October to hold the first Arab Day of Climate Action. These events included tweet chats, marches, workshop, seminar and music events and took place in Oman, United Arab Emirates, Mauritania, Bahrain, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt, Sudan, Libya, Algeria and Morocco leading to the newly formed Arab Youth Climate Movement gaining loads of international attention.
Rahma Daoud Abuswai, one of the young Qataris involved with AYCM said:
“There are not many youth movements related to climate change in the Arab region. The fact that this movement will combine all these youths from different countries around a single purpose is amazing.”
You can connect with the Arab Youth Climate Movement on their Flickr stream, Twitter and/or Facebook and find out what they have planned for the next round of UN climate talks, starting later this month.
Together with partners like IndyACT and 350, members of our TckTckTck team organized and ran a workshop in Egypt earlier this year, where about 20 out of 500 interested activists from across the region came together to kickstart the AYCM. On Saturday, we also helped with regional and sub-regional media work as well as some social media buzz around the Day of Action. It’ll be great to see the activists do great things going forward. Check out this Guardian blog by our Executive Director Kelly Rigg for more.
After years of campaigning, Australia commits to Kyoto again
It’s been many years of hard campaigning for our partners in Australia to convince their government to sign up for a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. Fortunately, last Friday their hard work paid off, as Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced that Australia would remain part of the groundbreaking agreement. While there are some less-than-ideal conditions attached to the commitment, the victory is still well-deserved. Congratulations to WWF Australia, Greenpeace Australia, GetUp, The Climate Institute, Climate Action Network Australia, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition and many others on their efforts, including last weeks’ successful Twitterstorm.
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