April showers are ushering in a new batch of global warming-related protests aimed at “Big Oil” and policies that favor expanded use of coal and natural gas.

Today’s “Fossil Fools” campaign is the brainchild of the Energy Action Coalition, Rainforest Action Network and Rising Tide, grassroots groups that are organizing more than 100 actions against fossil fuels around the world, most in the United States but a few in Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand.

The activists are planning to crash today’s hearing of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which has summoned executives from Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, Chevron and ConocoPhillips to defend their continued high profits amid high energy prices.

This year’s protests are intended to be slightly more disruptive than in the past, reflecting an increased sense of urgency, Energy Action Coalition spokeswoman Brianna Cayo Cotter said. “This year the youth in our movement have been clamoring, saying ‘We’re sick of talking about climate change; we need to do something about it.’” Energy Action Coalition has been behind a number of campaigns, including last November’s “Step it Up” series of rallies around the country in the name of reducing U.S. emissions 80 percent by 2050 and establishing a moratorium on coal-fired power plants.

Several actions scheduled for today involve Critical Mass bike rides, which started in 1992 in San Francisco as an attempt to reexamine transportation and planning from a non-car perspective and has resulted in hundreds of arrests over the years for blocking traffic. Other protests include rallies against planned coal-fired power plants in Columbia, S.C., and Walla Walla, Wash., as well as tar sands projects in Alberta and coalbed methane development in British Columbia. There is a protest at Washington University in St. Louis against Bank of America’s lending to coal-fired power plant developers, and an assembly on the steps of the Connecticut Capitol.

‘More and more civil disobedience’

“I think it’s just starting; it’s only going to get bigger,” Cotter said. She expects “more and more civil disobedience, particularly among young people,” spurred by frustration at the regulatory process. “They see policies aren’t working to stop coal-fired plants, so they’ll put their bodies on the line,” she added. Rising Tide and other international groups are more willing to engage in direct confrontation, Cotter said.

Rising Tide spokeswoman Monica Vaughan confirmed that people were planning events using “nonviolent civil disobedience, which we refer to as ‘direct action.’”

“People are frustrated with governments and corporations making all these promises but doing nothing to contribute to restructuring” of society to reduce dependence on polluting fossil fuels, Vaughan said. Last month, for example, Rising Tide and Earth First! sponsored a protest of a gas-fired power plant being built by FPL Energy in Palm Beach, Fla., that activists said would produce 12 million tons of CO2 per year. They halted construction work for six hours, and 27 people were arrested.

On the virtual side, the coalition is holding an election to determine the “fossil fool of the year.” Candidates include the chief executive officers of Exxon Mobil, Bank of America, General Motors and Dynegy Corp., as well as Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach for his efforts to boost tar sands production. Other categories include “most inauspicious newcomer,” for which the CEOs of Dominion Power, Marathon Oil, ADM and Penske Automotive are in the running; “outstanding performance in corporate greenwashing”; and “lifetime achievement,” for which voters can choose from West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin (D), Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship, Ford Motor Co. Chairman William Clay Ford or the team of President Bush and Vice President Cheney.

As of last night, Bush and Cheney were winning the lifetime achievement race by a landslide, as was ADM’s Patricia Woertz in the newcomer category.

“Now is the time to take steps toward creating a cleaner environment, however insignificant and useless those steps may be. That’s why I’m doing my own laughably inconsequential part to end pollution, limit damage to our precious ecosystem, and preserve what remains of our planet’s biodiversity for future generations.”

Needs are met with energy. Am I living a less moral life because I use traditional power sources? No. We know the unit of the state and and the MNC will be the most capable of change– our citizen role is to demand that change and to accept the consequences that will indoubtedly come with it…

But I did enjoy inciting the wrath of the eco-warriors by asking for the invention of a solar powered curling iron if they wanted me to forgo the prime saturday night primping hours in the name of their aim. ; )

Fossil Fool Day seems like a good opportunity to get arrested, though it is undeniably more hardcore than Earth Hour.

I disagree and agree. On the one hand, everything you say is true, on the other hand, as for making sacrifice explicitly part of the public discourse, it probably must appear first as token before it can become as substantial.

It is arguable whether this was a sacrifice at all. People turned off some ‘non-essential’ lights and gadgets, possibly replacing them with fossil fuel derived candles. It is possible for a ’sacrifice’ to be so tokenistic as to be counterproductive. That is especially true when you consider the sacrifice people in the Artic, small island states, and river deltas will be making.

Perhaps we need a really great Don’t Fly This Year movement, with local groups & campaigns?

Convincing people not to fly is amazingly difficult. When I argue that I shouldn’t fly, that choice is constantly attacked by friends of mine who are aware of the scale and seriousness of climate change. Not being able to fly might be the most inconvenient truth of all, at least for the demographic that visits this site.

Earth Hour Success!

Earth Hour was an astronomical success! At 8:50pm the electricity consumption in the city dropped by 264 Megawatts, which is approximately 175,000 households. And much of the city remains dark.

Reuters UK - 12 hours ago
By James Thornhill SYDNEY (Reuters) - More than half of Australian adults switched off their lights in major cities on Saturday as part of Earth Hour to raise awareness about climate change, organizers of the event said, citing a poll.

Suggested actions:

* Block gas stations and biofuel facilities

* Protest outside banks that fund oil projects

* Deflate the tires of SUVs

* Protest outside travel agencies

* Block road construction

* Form a critical mass of cyclists and block traffic

* Block access to mines and powerplants

* Protest at corporate HQs

R.K.,

That is the Bank Street Canal Bridge, near the Glebe in Ottawa.

I think it is among the most elegant structures in the city. It is also notable because of how much its mood can change on the basis of lighting.