No protests at the oil terminal
What I’m saying. We can’t stop. We refuse to stop. We keep driving straight at the edge, accelerator to the floor.
Three members of the Just Stop Oil campaign held on remand by Warwickshire police were taken to Coventry magistrates court on Monday morning.
Katheryn Dowds, 28, Jake Handling, 27, and Josh Smith, 29, pleaded guilty to aggravated trespass at the Kingsbury oil terminal after their solicitor did not appear to advise them, according to a campaign source.
Dowds was fined £327, and Handling and Smith were fined £150 each. All were then released, only to be immediately rearrested and held again by police for breaching a high court injunction banning protests at the Kingsbury site, Just Stop Oil said.
We refuse to apply the brakes, and we punish people who try to persuade us to apply the brakes.
Just Stop Oil has been staging direct actions, including mass trespasses, tunnelling and blockades, at oil terminals and in locations around the Midlands and the south-east of England since 1 April in an effort to disrupt the supply of fossil fuels. They have vowed to continue until the government agrees to a moratorium on new fossil fuel projects.
We can’t stop. We’ll never stop. Don’t look up.
We need to reverse cooling of the oceans in three decades to save all the remaining coral.
I don’t even know if that’s possible.
It isn’t just temperature changes in the ocean, either. It’s acidification caused by taking up more carbon dioxide. If the oceans continue to get warmer and more acidic, most species currently living there won’t be able to. And there is literally no other place for them to go.
I volunteer or have volunteered with various rescue groups (SAR, MR, ARES) over the last few years, whose membership is largely down-to-earth, working-class people. Lots of fire fighters, mechanics, nurses, etc.: just people who work hard, raise families, and want to give back to their community. I think that describes a lot of people–perhaps even most. I’m a white-collar worker, so it does me good to get out, away from my computer/desk, and help a little among these very community-minded persons. I say all this because almost to a person, none of them have any idea about the danger posed by climate change. It’s not on their radar, at all. I don’t really know why that is, or how to change it; surely to some degree (no pun intended) the fault lies with people like me who ostensibly do understand it but just are not getting the message across. I suspect that the issue is perceived as being so politicized now that none of them want to touch it with a ten foot pole, so I try to keep my political leanings hidden deeply on the few occasions when someone remarks something along the lines of “the fire season this year sure is bad”, and I interject a comment about record temperatures in response. This sort of tip-toeing seems necessary for group adhesion; nobody knows what anyone really thinks, politically, in our groups, and we need to be able to completely trust and depend upon the persons who might be backing us up on a mission. But I probably should have been screaming warnings from the rooftops for years already, instead of doing this careful little dance.
Our entire society and economy is based on carbon. There is not enough lithium or wind and nuclear is verboten. The embedded energy in green energy is also high…and often toxic.
these virtue signaling protestors would be more effective attacking food distribution or medical services because the real problem is…7 billion people. I hope none of them have any children? We can’t all live off the grid either. Nobody in the west or aspiring countries will volunteer to live like an 11th century peasant or a !Kung tribesman and if we did there are too many of us to be supported by such technology.
Not every problem can be solved. And certainly not by beardo kids protesting. Did they all walk to the protest.? Fly by flapping their wings? Are they wearing modern clothes?
You don’t know they’re virtue signaling. Of course the problem is 7 billion people, but then what? Not every problem can be solved and it looks as if this one can’t possibly be, but does it follow that people shouldn’t protest? Not in my book.
South Australia, via major investments in wind generation with battery storage, and amazing uptake of domestic rooftop solar, is now going for days at a time without a single atom of carbon generated electricity. We are fortunate that we have a sunny clime, but this shows what can be done.
Several major shopping malls have erected shelters over all their outdoor carparks, providing shade for customers’ cars. That’s nice. Even better is that these are all topped with solar panels powering the mall.
https://www.vicinity.com.au/about-us/newsroom/vicinity-news/australia-s-largest-car-park-solar-program-completed-in-sa
We also have V8 cars racing using 85% ethanol. But the best a consumer can use is 10% ethanol, giving a negligible reduction in CO2 emissions.
Our current government tells us climate change will be mitigated by “technology yet to be invented” all the while ignoring the technology we are already using.
Ophelia: I am just being a Gloomy Gus. Fatalism and passivity is one of my biggest character flaws.
While still noting the embedded energy and often toxicity of much green energy. Lithium is nasty stuff.
Ethanol is terrible for car engines. And growing the corn (at least in the US) has energy and environmental issues.
Brian M
We need to use less energy, not (just) different types of fuel. Radically and drastically so. Immediately.
That’s why protests are important, even if they turn out to be ineffectual.
To add to my above post
https://reneweconomy.com.au/south-australia-grid-reaches-record-high-of-136-6-pct-renewables/
Ethanol is an inefficient fuel, and not a good choice environmentally. In my area, people buy electric cars and plug them into coal; the gas is cleaner than coal.
It’s not just alternative fuels; it’s the enormous SUVs carrying one person, the monster trucks that use enormous power; the cranking of the air conditioning to 60 in the summer and heating to 80 in the winter; the massive use of semis to carry goods, many of them packaged in petroleum-based products; the overuse of nearly everything…the list is endless.
And the baby race. Even the countries, like China, that once realized the problems they faced with a rapidly growing population (housing, utilities, etc) has now backed down and is screaming for more babies. Our economy is based on constant growth, and constant growth is not feasible. We cannot grow infinitely on a finite planet with finite resources. And leaving the planet? Yeah, right. If we even succeeded, where do you think they’d be getting the resources to support a colony of humans on a planet without resources?
I believe we’re doomed, but in my more optimistic moments (which are few) I pretend I don’t believe that. The question isn’t if, but when.
It wasn’t even fun while it lasted…
The real problem isn’t “the 7 billion”. It’s the 700 million — that is, the richest 10% of the world’s population who are responsible for half of all emissions (https://oi-files-d8-prod.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/file_attachments/mb-extreme-carbon-inequality-021215-en.pdf).