Greenpeace

Written by Megan Johnston: Biking through Wilmington NC is a completely different experience than driving through it! I smiled the entire four mile trek from campus to downtown. We had signs on our backs and flags flying behind our bikes, calling for a clean energy future and for politicians to get to work for people, not polluters! It was incredible to hear all of the cars honking in support and to see all of friendly waves from passers-by. I felt like I was making a difference, more of a difference than I could make by just recycling and using less. We were putting ourselves out there and showing our city what is possible when we work together for an idea that's bigger than ourselves. I’ve never really felt like I was part of something, and to now be a part of something that means so much to me is just amazing. Before I became involved, I felt like no one else cared about what was happening to our environment, and I felt like there was so little I could do to help. I now realize what a huge movement that I’m involved in, and that there are millions of people around the world just like me. It’s incredibly inspiring to be surrounded by people who care about the environment and our future. I’m so proud to be a part of UNCW ECO and a part of the largest movement of our generation. Now is the time to make a difference!

I flew over the Deepwater Disaster spill again this past Monday.  I was shocked, once again, as I witnessed the lackadaisical cleanup efforts.  I know that an oil spill cannot be completely cleaned up, but there should at least be an honest and organized effort to do everything we can! I saw highly ineffective plastic booms along the Gulf Coast and a few boats scooping up very miniscule fractions of the spill. Some of the booms have floated ashore, crinkled up on the beach; some sit perpendicular to the shoreline; others are overturned by waves; some pieces of them have broken off and are floating lazily with the waves. The high volume flow of oil, certainly more than 5000 barrels per day, into the Gulf, still hasn’t been stopped. What is going on? Why isn’t an effective, organized cleanup being mandated?! This is outrageous.



Several segments of the media are relying on erroneous information from BP and the Coast Guard in reporting the magnitude of the “ongoing cleanup” activities.  Even the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has it wrong. NOAA currently indicates on their maps that there are areas of “potential beached oil” in Venice, Louisiana when there is definite beached oil, whose magnitude of which is far greater than what is depicted on the maps. I have seen it with my own eyes.

Our government’s failure to hold corporations responsible has allowed the spill to run wild and completely out of control. Yes, get angry. It didn’t have to get to this point. We had the cleanup solution to a spill of this enormity. In 1993, nearly 800 million gallons of oil were dumped into the Persian Gulf. They were not only able to prevent this spill from being an environmental catastrophe, but to also salvage 85 percent of the oil. Nick Pozzi, an engineer who worked on that spill, has been offering the lessons he learned to BP. The manager at BP in charge of this cleanup effort, told Pozzi simply not to bother him.  BP will not even utilize the advice of educated and experienced scientists and engineers.

There should be someone other than BP directing the cleanup operation from the site of the spill to the threatened coastal estuaries. We are in a dire situation down here, and we need the most qualified people working on this spill.  We need all the help we can get here. It is going to be even more terrible as this slick continues to come onshore.

Please share my stories with all you know. We need this to be a massive wakeup call to the fact that our government is indeed run by the fossil fuel industries. We must stop this, and we need every one of us pushing as hard as we can for a clean energy economy.

Deep down, I am hopeful that positive change will come out of this if we all utilize our anger and momentum. Please know that we have a long, hard fight ahead.

Please stay strong and stay actively fighting with me.

I feel sick. Completely sick. The oil is creeping toward my home in Alabama as I write this, and it is breaking my heart.

I grew up in one of the most beautiful places.  Fairhope, Alabama.  Barrier islands, bays, rivers, creeks, and the Gulf were all my playing grounds.  At 7 years old, I was packing my lunch and spending the whole day exploring them in my little 13 foot boat.  All the beautiful trees, wildlife and pristine waters, all will see the thick black and red oil dispersant within these next days.  It brings a deeper ache than I can express.

As I flew out to the spill last Friday with my father (he’s a pilot), I wasn’t prepared for what I was going to witness. Here are some notes I took during the flight as we approached the source of this disaster:

“We are starting to smell oil...the pungent smell burns my nostrils and I feel nauseated to the core of my being….oh my God…streaks of oil are everywhere…thick black near the well…it is crude oil and it stretches as far as I can see…I am sick…I can’t feel my own body or distinguish any of my feelings right now… this is the worst and most saddening situation I have ever seen in my life…The boats are randomly skewn about, and they are so disorganized! The cleanup efforts look completely haphazard and ineffective. It is utter chaos down there! Boats randomly placed pulling booms, swirling the oil around in circles! I really don’t feel alive right now…this is a horrible dream…why the heck are we drilling offshore - we don't need to drill offshore!”

It was so much worse than I could have ever imagined and not even close to what the media has been portraying.  I couldn’t even take it all in. I saw miles and miles of crude oil pouring from the Earth’s core to the ocean’s surface and then it proceeded to move eerily and ominously with the current toward my home. Before I even registered sadness, tears poured down my face. My entire body cried. I felt so helpless looking down at that uncontainable and chaotic mess.  I will never be able to clear that picture from my mind.

This disaster could have been prevented, yet it wasn’t due to BP’s own negligence and a weak national energy policy. What’s outrageous is that BP is doing everything they can to avoid assuming responsibility for this spill. How dare they try and sidestep responsibility for one of the worst, quite probably the worst disaster in the Gulf’s history?!?!?!

BP was able to tiptoe around doing an environmental impact statement, and look at what we got. Over 4 million gallons of crude oil destroying the Gulf coast, innumerable wildlife habitats, crippling local economies - this is destroying my home. This is a sure sign that oil companies indeed have enormous influence over our government and dictate our country's energy policy.

The time of giveaways and loose regulation of the oil industry must end. I hope with all my heart that this disaster will be a wakeup call.  Things must change. Congress needs to ban offshore drilling and President Obama needs to provide unwavering support to end offshore drilling. Please talk to your friends. Talk to your neighbors. Start organizing yourselves. If we continue on our current path of carelessly extracting fossil fuels like oil and coal, rather than harnessing clean, renewable energy like wind power, we will see many more tragedies like the Deepwater Disaster.

From the disaster zone,

Brinkley

As soon as I brought out the blownup facebook page cutout at the Harvard Earth Day festival last weekend, curious students lined up to have their picture taken. Hundreds of Harvard students participated in the photo petition drive calling on Facebook to power their new datacenter in Oregon with renewable energy instead of coal.

 

Because Harvard is the birthplace of Facebook, Harvard students have a special connection to it. The students were excited to call on Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook and former Harvard student, to make Facebook grow responsibly.

When students were told that Facebook would be relying primarily on the last remaining coal plant in Oregon and that the plant trucks in its coal from Wyoming, they found it to be absolutely outrageous. “Coal is a fuel of the past. Facebook needs to jump on board and be a leader in our transition to cleaner energy,” one Harvard student said.

This campaign is particularly exciting for young people because Facebook is something with which our age group is very familiar. We all use it. The average user checks their Facebook page many times throughout the day.  For Facebook to also use its own platform to educate its 350 million users about its switch to renewable energy and to advocate for stronger climate policy would be huge!

You too can ask Faceook to quit coal.  Join the facebook page now.

 

 

I’ve been asked if I still had hope going into this last day of the Copenhagen International Climate Negotiations. Definitely. Yes. I did.

President Obama and all the other heads of state would not be attending these negotiations if it were not to decide on something big. Rumor was that Obama would have some new updates on US commitments and surely, his presence alone has the potential to move nations just as it did last November when the global community celebrated his election.

 

The President’s 10-speech this morning, however, left me severely disappointed in his lack of leadership.

In the speech, Obama still only commits the US to a lousy 4% emissions reduction from 1990 levels by 2020 (the science calls for 25-40% below 1990 levels by 2020). I was hoping President Obama would bring news today that he is pushing the U.S. commitment to higher levels. Why isn’t he showing leadership on this issue?

If I were President Obama, I would be extremely ashamed to bring such a low level of ambition to these  negotiations. We need to be communicating our disappointment now.

One thing I know for sure is that we, as activists in the environmental movement, are doing our part. If world leaders come out of Copenhagen with a poor deal, they need to know it is because they have failed us.

 

 

If you haven’t called President Obama’s administration yet, PLEASE DO!  We must create even more pressure today and hold these talks accountable to the demands of our movement!

The action is not over. We need an escalation. In the US, you still have the voice and we need to be loudest today.