Yes.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that immigration is part of our fight in the climate movement.  Here’s why I think we need to be actively involved in the immigrant-rights battle that’s going on right now.

In terms of “stopping climate change,” “containing climate change,’ or even “preventing the collapse of civilization as we know it,” we’re fucked.  Really fucked.  Bill McKibben’s new book, Eaarth, makes that abundantly clear.  The title reflects the point that the planet we used to know is gone.  McKibben couldn’t possibly be any clearer about the fact that there is no hope of avoiding the collapse of our civilization.  What matters at this point is what the collapse will look like and what will come next, and that’s also the scariest part.

When the industrial economy collapses and we move toward a more manual labor based economy, that could be a good opportunity for mass awakening.  It could be a chance for our society to collectively say “Maybe trying to meet our emotional needs through material consumption wasn’t a good idea” or “Maybe greed and competition weren’t the best values on which to base our culture and economy.”  There will undeniably be extreme hardship and loss of life, but it could reconnect us to our humanity, and a new society more in line with our true values could be build on the ashes of this one.

But history suggests otherwise.  While there has never been this kind of collapse on a planetary scale, there have been local precedents.  Whether environmentally induced like in Darfur or economically induced like in Germany in 1930, societies have gone into free fall.  But rarely have those societies acknowledged that they had it coming due to systemic problems in the way they were living.  Much more commonly, a person or group stepped up and said “THOSE people, they are the problem.”  Then the scapegoated group and civil liberties were sacrificed in the name of reestablishing order and security.

The scariest thing in our future is not the physical limitations we will face, but who will be blamed and what moral sacrifices will be made in the futile attempt to maintain order.  That is why what we are doing is so important.  If we go over that edge with a clear focus on climate change, we can acknowledge the true culprit and learn from our parents’ mistakes.  But without that focus, we are susceptible to any interpretation.  Just as climate change is already here, the battle for how we will deal with it is already here as well.

The current immigration debate did not emerge out of a vacuum, and was not nearly as heated just three years ago.  But then gas prices shot up because we are running out of oil.  As the cheap and easily accessible oil peaked, supplies ran short and speculators panicked.  While the oil driven economy at large suffered, the greatest impact was on the housing market since the glut of suburban houses with 90 minute commutes were suddenly less attractive.  So the economy tanked and unemployment skyrocketed.  Since the root issue of basing our economy on a rapidly depleting resource is uncomfortable to deal with, the right wing demagogues had no trouble selling their argument that “THOSE people stole your jobs.”  Hence the front page quote from Archie Archuleta last week about the current atmosphere being more hateful toward immigrants than any point in his 60 years of dealing with immigration issues.  This is a harbinger of things to come.  The current battleground of hatred is immigration, and it matters who wins.  If hatred wins the day today, we face a much darker tomorrow.

If our groups stay out of this issue, we implicitly support the notion that this is just about immigrants.  But the hatred toward immigrants is not just an alternative to compassion toward immigrants; it is also an alternative to a rational discussion of the real problems with our economy and society.  Xenophobia is the alternative to honest introspection.  The climate movement needs to be actively standing up for that voice of honest introspection.  We need that introspection now, and we’re really going to need it down the road.

Yesterday, the tar sands industry met unexpected opposition.

The Salt Lake Tribune captured it best:

“A small Canadian company, in need of millions for its ambitious plans, also is facing stiff opposition from two Utah environmental groups that are trying to thwart its efforts to build one of the first commercial tar sand mines in the country.”

Photo credit: Sarah A. Miller/Deseret News

The Utah Division of Oil, Gas and Mining (DOGM), held a hearing on Canadian company Earth Energy Resources’ proposal to mine tar sands in Grand and Uintah Counties in Eastern Utah. Well over half of the people attending the hearing came to support Peaceful Uprising and Living Rivers in opposing the mine. John Baza, Director of the the Division noted that there were far more people than usually attend these hearings.

“This project has no real value or contribution to society,” said John Weisheit, Colorado Riverkeeper and Conservation Director of Living Rivers. “The total amount of oil produced by this mine over seven years of operation would cover just 4 hours of American oil demand – a tiny blip on the radar. However, it will take millennia to restore the watershed they are about to destroy.”

And for that small amount of oil, Earth Energy Resources and the State of Utah are willing to put the entire Colorado River watershed and the 30 million people it supports at risk. Here are a few of the concerns we brought up at the hearing:

• The oil produced by the mine would increase the amount of tar sands oil refined in the Salt Lake area by 13%. This places local communities at increased risk for contamination from arsenic, lead, mercury, nickel, cyanide and other toxic substance.
• The mine will generate significant amounts of dust, which contaminates local bodies of water and settles on snowpack, causing it to melt faster.
• Although tar sands produce on average three times the greenhouse gas emissions as conventional oil, the DOGM refuses to take climate change into account for the permitting of this mine.
• Earth Energy Resources already has a poor track record in preventing groundwater contamination. Their pilot mine was essentially abandoned, left unlined, unmonitored and untreated for years, available for wildlife and livestock to consume.
• The chemicals to be used by Earth Energy Resources have been untested as potential carcinogens, or reproductive and developmental risks, and are known to be endocrine disruptors.

Earth Energy Resources claims they will operate the mine with zero discharge, but there is no man-made technology that can guarantee zero leakage of contamination into our waters.

Steve Adler, an attorney with the Utah Energy Office, asserted that the DOGM was simply approving the permit according the requirements set by the State of Utah, and that DOGM wasn’t responsible for addressing many of the objections raised in the hearing, specifically climate change and water impacts. Baza will decide within a month whether or not to uphold the agency’s decision to approve the mine permit.

The biggest message that came out of this hearing is that no one is steering this ship. There is no single agency or government body evaluating whether tar sands development is actually a good idea for Utah. Instead, each agency simply approves rules and permits that were not designed for to regulate the tar sands industry. If Utah is going to consider opening up its lands and waters to tar sands, we should actually have that conversation about Utah’s energy future.

“This is only the beginning,” said Ashley Anderson, Coordinator of Peaceful Uprising. “Communities around the state and country are getting active in opposing the tar sands. We’ll be there fighting back every step of the way.”

Thank you to everyone who attended the hearing and everyone who has gotten involved in our work to stop the tar sands!

This weekend, Moab residents hiked up to Delicate Arch to call on governments and banks to stop funding the expansion of tar sands in North America, as part of the International Stop The Tar Sands Day.

Utah could soon have first tar sands mine in the country, located north of Moab in the Colorado River watershed.  Canadian company Earth Energy Resources aims to extract 2,000 barrels a day of tar sands oil from their PR Springs Mine.  Earth Energy Resources has received all of the required permits to begin operation except for the Conditional Use Permit from Grand County.

“Grand County Council has the power to choose between investment in a dirty fuel that destroys our land, water and wildlife, or development of clean energy sources that enhances our beautiful and vibrant way of life,” said Moab local Ashley Anderson.

Tar sands, also called oil sands in Canada, produce one of the dirtiest fuels on the planet.  On average, each barrel of tar sands oil generates three times the greenhouse gases as conventional fuel, consume or contaminate two to four barrels of water, and expose ground water to toxic pollutants such as arsenic, lead, mercury, nickel and cyanide.  Extraction of tar sands in Canada has devastated an area the size of Florida.

“This area should be known for the iconic beauty that draws travels from around the world, not for introducing one of the worst forms of energy to the United States,” said Juliana Williams, one of the organizers for the event. “We refuse to sit idly by as the State of Utah and Earth Energy Resources trade away our future.”

Other events with the “International Stop the Tar Sands Day” took place in Berlin, London, Copenhagen, Montreal and Toronto.

SUSANNE VIELMETTER LOS ANGELES PROJECTS

Closing Party in Honor of Andrea Bowers and Tim DeChristopher

Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects is pleased to invite you to the closing party in honor of Andrea Bowers’ solo exhibition.Special guest and environmental activist Tim DeChristopher will be present and answer questions.

Artworks by Andrea Bowers, Edgar Arceneaux, Jedediah Caesar, Glenn Kaino, Olga Koumoundouros, Shana Lutker, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Rodney McMillian, Henry Taylor and others will be available in support of raising funds for Tim DeChristopher’s climate action group, Peaceful Uprising.

In December 2008 Tim DeChristopher disrupted a government auction of 150,000 acres of wilderness for oil and gas drilling as an act of civil disobedience. This action caused many of the leases, which would have permitted drilling on pristine acres of public land in Utah, to be canceled. But for DeChristopher, there have been serious consequences. Because of his action, he faces up to 10 years in prison and fines of $750,000. His trial is set for September 13, 2010.

For more information on Tim DeChristopher, please visit www.bidder70.org and www.climatetrial.com.

Saturday, July 31, 6 pm at the gallery

6006 Washington Boulevard, Culver City, California 90232

phone 310.837-2117 www.vielmetter.com

Please RSVP to kevin@vielmetter.com

[Download the PDF for printing]

A struggle is increasingly being fought between water and oil, not only over them. Tar sands are at the center of this tension. As the province rushes towards a large-scale extraction, the social, ecological and human impacts are hitting a crisis point. In only a few short years the continent will be a crisscross of pipelines, reaching from the arctic all the way to the southern US.

When: Tuesday, July 20th, 7:00 pm

Where: First Unitarian Church of SLC, 569 S. 1300 E. [map]

This is a free screening, but donations to cover the costs of screening and promoting are welcome. Following the movie, join Peaceful Uprising for a short discussion about the threat of tar sands to Utah.

Today, the Obama Administration announced that they are opening 1.8 million in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve to oil and gas drilling.  Apparently, between the Bush and Obama Administrations not much has changed in the handouts our federal government gives to the oil and gas industries at the expense of Americans and future generations.  And of course we’ve seen how well drilling protects the environment.

Well, potential bidders, the auction closes August 11th.  Who will be the new Bidder 70?

Obama to open 1.8M Alaskan acres to drilling

07/09/2010

Patrick Reis, E&E reporter

The Interior Department today announced plans to open 1.8 million acres of Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve to new oil and gas drilling.

The Bureau of Land Management is selling leases on 190 tracts in the reserve. Bidding will close Aug. 11.

Nearly 1 million acres in and around the reserve’s Teshekpuk Lake were put off-limits to drilling to protect important habitat for migratory birds and the local caribou herd.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the lease sale balances a commitment to energy production with environmental protection.

“This sale reflects the Administration’s continuing efforts to encourage environmentally responsible development of domestic energy resources, including fossil fuels, to reduce our nation’s heavy dependence on imported oil,” Salazar said in a statement. “It also demonstrates our continuing commitment to protect and conserve wildlife and their habitat on sensitive public lands with exceptional ecological value.”

There are currently 310 authorized oil and gas leases on 3 million acres of the National Petroleum Reserve, which sprawls across 23 million acres on the North Slope.

Podcast: Download (10.2MB)

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – Veteran climate activist Ted Glick discusses his new book, Love Refuses to Quit: Climate Change and Social Change in the 21st Century. Glick was recently sentenced to one year probation and a $1,100 fine for hanging two banners that read “Green Jobs Now” at the Hart Senate Building. We discuss his life and activism. www.tedglick.com. © Copyright 2010, krcl

Written by Deb Henry

Did you know Canada is now the biggest oil supplier to the United States?

The Alberta Tar Sands are one of the most horrific environmental catastrophes of all time — yet bring Shell and it’s Big Oil bandwagon record profits at the expense of the local population, world population and landscape. The area in Canada that has been devastated is larger than the state of
Florida and has diagnosed unprecedented numbers of rare cancers occurring in the same area. Fuel from the oil sands is the dirtiest in the world, producing three times the global warming
pollution as conventional oil.

Tar Sands have never been thought to be economically viable in the USA. I’m not even really sure they make sense now, but there is a company called Earth Energy Resources that is going to try to find
out. They’re opening the first tar sands mine in the United States…and it’s going to be here in Utah. The process itself is extremely energy intensive producing a low energy return on investment compared to the original energy investment. It’s one thing if an investment is energy intensive to produce a cleaner energy source…but tar sands use a dirty energy investment to produce a even dirtier energy product. This is a huge step in the wrong direction.

“A nation that does not innovate has no wings. A country that does not innovate, stagnates.” – Joe Biden

Tar Sands (also called Oil Sands in Canada) produce an unconventional fossil fuel from bitumen, a “thick tar-like substance” that is the lowest grade of crude oil. According to Earth Energy Resources, after strip-mining, the ore will be heated and treated with chemicals into a slurry with the “consistency of a thick gritty milkshake.” One the bitumen is separated from this slurry, it is cooked and upgraded to a synthetic crude oil and trucked to refineries. Refineries remove and store toxic pollutants such as arsenic, cyanide, benzene, salt, lead,
mercury and nickel before finally processing the crude into gasoline or diesel fuel.

This process is going to consume other dirty fossil fuels …to produce more fossil fuels. There is a natural gas pipeline nearby which will help run the machinery that makes this mining possible. Natural gas in and of itself is a gross process that uses the under-regulated hydraulic fracturing, and the so-called clean energy it produces is being used to mine one of the ugliest forms of energy that exists. The mine will also have diesel generators on hand just in case the supply of natural gas is unavailable. The materials
will be trucked in on a dirt road (that is not designed for large trucks) to haul these materials. This will produce large amounts of dust which will blow right into neighboring states (if even more water is not used to constantly spray down the roads), potentially compromising their ski resorts. The only way that EER is going to be able to make this a profitable enterprise is by externalizing the consequences onto us.

For each barrel of oil that is produced, two barrels of water will be used (4,000 barrels per day, total). These means that water rights which would have typically gone to down-stream farmers, are going to be used by EER. The PR Spring Mine Tar Sands Mine site is situated right between the Colorado River, Green River and White River. The potential contamination of a river system that funnels down into Lake Mead and Lake Powell, not to mention Mexico is very real. We don’t need a disaster like the mess in the Gulf of Mexico poisoning such a critical water source.

Is this the best innovation we can come up with for energy? Are we really willing to endure the consequences of all of these byproducts, not to mention water consumption? The production capacity is only going to be 2,000 barrels of oil per day. Contrast this against 19,500,000 barrels per day that the USA consumes.
This isn’t even going to be a drop in the bucket and Utah is going to be the place that endures the consequences for the over-consumption of the USA as a whole.

Beyond Earth Energy Resources, several other companies are lining up to mine tar sands in Utah, including Nevtah, Korea Technology Industry of America (KTIA), and Red Leaf Resources. The outcome of the Earth Energy Resources PR Spring Mine will set the tone for future tar sands development in Utah and the country. If the mine is constructed, it will ease the way for increased future tar sands extraction. But if we stop the PR Spring Mine, it will send a message to investors that Utahns do not want tar sand mines in our state.

Utah deserves better.

Why not just create good-paying, lasting American jobs that wind and solar and efficiency projects create — the kind of jobs that can’t be outsourced. Instead of investing in these strip-mine-sinkholes of temporary solutions to energy, Utah could be creating real, constant sources of energy and jobs. We could be creating new markets and new technology for alternatives but instead we continue to spin our wheels by clinging to our oil dependency.

What you can do:

• Come see the movie H2Oil on 7/20, at
  7:30pm in SLC, location currently at the Unitarian Church, but may
  change to a larger venue.
• Come to the meeting at 7/27, 2pm, at the DOGM
• Join the mailing list at Peaceful Uprising.
• Help us get local businesses to sign on that they don’t want tar
  sand mines in Utah.

Links:

• The Energy Return of Tar Sands
• Love
  Winter, Hate the Oil Sands
• DirtyOilSands.org
• AlterNet: Save Winter – Stop Tar Sands, the Dirtiest
  Form of Oil
• Alberta researchers receive apology for attack on oil
  sands study

Tomorrow, July 2nd, is the deadline for public comments on the Keystone XL pipeline that could bring 900,000 barrels of tar sands to American refineries each day. Tar sands are the dirtiest fuel we use, creating 3 times the greenhouse gases as conventional oil, contaminating entire rivers and watersheds from leaking toxic tailings lakes and devastating an area of Canada the size of Florida.

Last August, the State Department approved the permit for the pipeline, but they opened up the process to receive comments from the public. From the perspective of the State Department, this pipeline is in the public interest, bringing in oil and jobs. However, they fail to fully account for the massive impact that tar sands oil has on the climate, the pollution created by refining tar sands into gasoline and the danger the pipeline poses to landowners and communities along the pipeline route.

The good news is that public opposition is rallying to stop the pipeline. A week ago, 50 members of the House of Representatives sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, urging the State Department not to rush the permit through. At a public hearing at the State Department on Tuesday, over 80 people showed up to provide comment. Although Brian Duggan, the moderator of the hearing, noted that “the oil industry got up real early this morning, so their names are the first 20 on my list,” he alternated between speakers from the oil industry and groups opposed to the pipeline.

According to Sarah Murphy, who attended the hearing, approximately two-thirds to three quarters of the people attending the hearing opposed the pipeline. “At one point lobbyist from a trucking group testified and in his eyes I saw nothing but giant dollar signs,” she said. “From what I witnessed at the hearing today, its obvious that the dirty energy lobbyists care about only one thing- money.”

Please take five minutes to submit a comment to the State Department, urging them to stop the Keystone XL pipeline. They are required to read every comment, and we need to show them that the American public opposes this project. For ideas on what to include in your comments check out dirtyoilsands.org and Pubic Citizen in Texas, where most of the refineries would be located.