Eat your heart out Al Gore - youth ARE rising up and putting their bodies on the line to ensure a clean-energy future!
On two different sides of the globe - two inspiring actions happened in the past 24 hours demanding an end to the dirty coal industry. In Australia, Greenpeace occupied and shut down one of the country’s dirtiest coal power plants - the Munmorah plant on the NSW central coast.
And in Charlotte, NC - activists blockaded the headquarters of Duke Energy, over their proposed expansion of dirty coal energy. This is breaking news - so check back for updates, photos, and video
NORTH CAROLINA STUDENTS ARRESTED BLOCKADING THE ENTRANCE TO DUKE ENERGY HEADQUARTERS
Charlotte, NC –
At 12:30 today, (November 15th) two Warren Wilson College students dressed as polar bears were arrested while blockading the entrance to Duke Energy’s headquarters in downtown Charlotte. The students are demanding that the company stop its plans to build the new Cliffside coal-fired power plant, and are joined by concerned citizens dressed as Santa Claus and his Elves. Santa’s Elves presented Duke with a Christmas wish list of clean air, sustainable energy, and energy efficiency initiatives. “The bad kids get coal in their stockings, and we’re here to say that we don’t want any new coal,” said Keith Glendinning, a local resident.
“North Carolina’s youth will be living with the impact of dirty energy and climate change far into the future.
We need community-based alternatives to the fossil fuel empire.” said Nina Otter, a student at Warren Wilson College who locked herself to the entrance. “Coal has got to go if we want to solve the climate crisis.”
Climate scientists around the world agree that immediate actions must be taken to reduce levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in order to stop the worst impacts of climate change. Duke’s new Cliffside plant alone would emit 312 million tons of carbon dioxide over its fifty year lifespan, the equivalent of putting an additional one million cars on the roads.
The Cliffside plant will also emit pollutants such as mercury, nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide. Duke’s own calculations project a 10-fold increase in mercury emissions from the proposed plant over 2005 mercury emissions from the existing units. In addition, much of the coal burned at Cliffside would be extracted through the highly destructive practice of mountaintop removal. This practice has destroyed hundreds of square miles of the southern Appalachian Mountains and devastated thousands of miles of streams.
“North Carolina and Duke Energy need to follow the lead of other states such as Oklahoma and Florida that have said no to new coal plants. In order to avert catastrophic climate change our society must shift towards sustainable and socially responsible energy sources now. Coal is not a part of that equation”, said student activist Lindsay Popper.
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LEGAL FUNDS ARE NEEDED AND MUCH APPRECIATED!!
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thanks for posting so quickly Matt! great to hear that more folks are stepping it up! I hope that this action and the call in day will build momentum needed to stop this plant!
Do I recognize those polar bear heads from the South East Climate Convergence action? Go Warren Wilson, stepping it up and recycling the puppetry!
Thank you for showing that North Carolina doesn’t need ANY more coal plants! We need our shoreline and our mountains and clean air. We need to rebuild our economy with clean and safe green jobs. Great job today!
We make the road by walking, and it’s lookin pretty sweet.
this is wonderfully inspiring… MMMMMHMMMM! This Is It! a big ‘good on ya’ to folks all over this place! This can work… and a part of me can’t believe it. Thanks to all the folks who got in the way, thank you Peter Grey of NSW Australia, Nina Otter and Meagan Goodman of NC US. STUDENT ACTIVISTS… People like yourselves give me the strength i need, the confidence! the support. your criminal records and court fees are not for nothing. sincerely, THANK YOU.
do we all realize it yet? it is NAIVE to think we can rely on ‘business as usual’ or government legislation or carbon credit rules to start correcting our vices. it is NAIVE to think that the archtypal do-gooder ‘activist other’ will do it either. ITS YOU> …ME
soldier on~