Governor Gina Raimondo was the introductory speaker Tuesday morning at the AWEA Offshore WindPower 2016 conference in Warwick. Raimondo spoke to the conference attendees, mostly representatives of various wind power companies and allied industries, with some federal and state government employees on hand as well. Raimondo was keen on selling Rhode Island as a place for the growth and development of renewable energy such as solar and wind.”

“I am an advocate for the environment,” said Raimondo, “and I usually begin my comments in audiences such as these talking about the reality of climate change… Climate change is real, caused by human activity and not going to go away on it’s own. It’s up to us, policy makers, business leaders, entrepreneurs to meet the challenge of climate change.”

Comparing the problem of climate change to her work on pension reform, Raimondo said, “Climate change isn’t that different from big, thorny fiscal issues, which is to say it’s not going to go away unless we take action and it’s only going to get harder the longer we wait. So we have to meet the challenges of climate change with urgency and a seriousness of purpose, in the same way we would with other fiscal challenges.”

The governor then made her pitch for creating jobs in the state. “As Governor of Rhode Island I want my state to be a leader. Number one, it’s the right thing to do, number two, I want our state to be known as the state that solves problems and meets challenges. But number three, the silver lining in meeting the challenge of climate change is that we can create jobs.

“The good news here is that we can create jobs in solar, in wind, in energy efficiency, and those are the kind of jobs that I want to have here in Rhode Island.

“My message is that all the things about Rhode Island that enabled us to be first, with Deepwater Wind, are the reason you ought to think about doing business in Rhode Island,” said Raimondo, before making a very questionable claim that, “we have no fossil fuel industry here in Rhode Island. We’re not ‘as attached’ to [the] ‘good old’ fossil fuel industry. That’s a big deal. That means we have a culture embracing of this industry [wind energy].”

The governor’s press secretary, David Ortiz, later clarified what Governor Raimondo meant by this statement, saying that, “her point was that the state has no fossil fuel deposits and does not extract natural gas, crude oil or coal.”

Though this is true, it does not follow that Rhode Island has a “culture” embracing alternative energy. The fossil fuel industry has a giant economic, political and environmental presence in the state.

Putting aside the proposed Burrillville power plant, or any other of the proposed LNG infrastructure expansions in various stages of being approved, “Rhode Island’s Port of Providence,” according to the US Energy Information Administration (USEIA), “is a key regional transportation and heating fuel products hub” and “natural gas fueled 95 percent of Rhode Island’s net electricity generation in 2015.”

The USEIA goes on to say that Rhode Island “does not produce or refine petroleum,” as Raimondo’s office clarified, but, “Almost all of the transportation and heating fuel products consumed in Rhode Island, eastern Connecticut, and parts of Massachusetts are supplied via marine shipments through the Port of Providence. The port area has petroleum storage tanks, and a small-capacity petroleum product pipeline runs from the port to central Massachusetts.”

Rhode Island is heavily dependent on LNG imports. “Electric power generators and the residential sector are Rhode Island’s largest natural gas consumers. More than half of the natural gas consumed in the state goes to the electric power sector and almost all in-state electricity generation is fueled with natural gas,” says the USEIA, “Historically, natural gas has arrived in Rhode Island from producing areas in Canada and from the U.S. Gulf Coast and Mid-Continent regions, but increasing amounts of natural gas are coming from Appalachian Shales, particularly the Marcellus Shale of Pennsylvania.” This makes Rhode Island heavily dependent on fracked gas for its power generation.

And finally, as far as the dirtiest fossil fuel, coal, goes, “Providence is one of the leading coal import centers in the northeast, receiving one-tenth of the imported coal delivered to eastern customs districts in 2015. The state is part of the six-state Independent System Operator-New England (ISO-NE) regional grid. And, although Rhode Island and Vermont are the only two states in the nation with no coal-fired electricity generation, the ISO-NE grid remains dependent on coal-fired facilities during periods of peak electricity demand.”

So, although Rhode Island has no industry producing or refining fossil fuels, Rhode Island is heavily burdened and intertwined with the fossil fuel industry. We are soaking in fossil fuels as an importer and exporter. We fund the fracking of America with our energy choices, and even as we are economically and politically dictated to by companies like National Grid, Spectra, Invenergy and Motiva (a subsidiary of Saudi Aramco and Shell Oil Company, we bear the environmental scars of their abuse of our habitats and our health.

This is the fossil fuel industry in Rhode Island.

It is massive and it is killing us.

Also speaking at the AWEA Offshore WindPower 2016 conference was Deepwater Wind’s Jeff Grybowski, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and Representative David Cicilline.

]]> http://www.rifuture.org/no-fossil-fuel-industry-ri/feed/ 0 http://www.rifuture.org/raimondo-dog-whistles-fracking/ http://www.rifuture.org/raimondo-dog-whistles-fracking/#respond Thu, 06 Oct 2016 17:36:59 +0000 http://www.rifuture.org/?p=68382

“At breakfast this morning my nine year old, out of the blue, said, ‘Mom, what are you doing about climate change?’” said Governor Gina Raimondo at a press event in the offices of Newport Solar on Monday, “What a perfect day to ask the question! So I told him all about this and he was proud of me that we were on that.”

Newport Solar in North Kingstown is where Raimondo chose to kick off National Energy Awareness Month with her new Office of Energy Resources (OER) commissioner Carol Grant. Newport Solar is a Rhode Island leader in solar installation, and its successful efforts should be lauded.

“Our clean energy sector in Rhode Island has created a slew of new opportunities for education and jobs, and that will continue as we move forward in building the clean energy industry,” said Raimondo at the event.

Commissioner Grant spoke about Rhode Island’s high ranking in the State Energy Efficiency Scorecard. The American Council on Energy‐Efficient Economy (ACEEE) recently ranked Rhode Island fourth in the country for best energy efficiency programs and policies. “We want to educate Rhode Islanders on the many benefits of the state’s energy efficiency and renewable energy programs,” said Grant, “and we look forward to further developing a future of clean, affordable, reliable and diversified energy.” [italics mine]

Also at the event was Michael Ryan, Vice President of Government Affairs at National Grid, encouraging Rhode Islanders to save energy.

Energy in Rhode Island needs to be “affordable, reliable, and clean” said Raimondo, “It’s got to be all three, and it can be all three.”

Later, Raimondo’s three criteria had mysteriously become four, or more. “So I’m going to continue to lead and push, as your governor, towards more clean, affordable, and reliable and diversified energy sources… to lead the nation in more and more sources of clean, renewable, affordable, sustainable energy.”

Towards the end of the presser, National Grid’s Michael Ryan, ironically standing in front of a large Newport Solar banner emblazoned with the tagline, “Think outside the grid,” mis-repeated Raimondo, saying that the energy must be “efficient, affordable and reliable.

“Those are key with National Grid.”

In the video below you can watch the complete press event. Solar, wind and efficiency were lauded but fracked gas, the third leg of Raimondo’s energy policy, and a key driver of National Grid’s business, was never mentioned except via subtle dog whistles.

These dog whistles are words like reliable, diversified and efficient. These are the words anti-environmentalists use when they want to scare us into accepting fracked gas as a bridge fuel, like when Rush Limbaugh said, “Solar panels are not sustainable, Millennials. May sound good, yes. ‘Clean, renewable energy.’ But what do you do when the sun’s down at night? What do you do when the clouds obscure the sun? We’re not there yet.”

Limbaugh admits that solar panels are clean and renewable. But he’s doubting their reliability and sustainability.

This is how a politician like Raimondo can appease companies like National Grid, which are actively working to expand Rhode Island’s dependence on fossil fuels, while publicly talking only about the work she’s doing on energy that’s actually clean and renewable.

On April 13 Raimondo appeared at a solar farm in East Providence to announce the results of the 2016 Rhode Island Clean Energy Jobs Report released by the Rhode Island OER and the Executive Office of Commerce. At this event Marion Gold, who publicly supported the power plant planned for Burrillville, was still the OER commissioner.

“The clean energy economy is supporting nearly 14,000 jobs,” said Raimondo, “a forty percent increase from last year. That is amazing.”

The press release for this event noted that this job growth was likely the result of the “maturation of the solar industry, start up activity in smart grid technologies, and the progress made on the construction of the Block Island Wind Farm.”

There was no mention at this event of fracked gas, Burrillville, Invenergy, Spectra pipelines, or National Grid’s expansion of LNG at Fields Point, until reporters asked the governor about it directly, at which point Raimondo somewhat reluctantly admitted that she does in fact support Invenergy’s $700 million fracked gas and diesel oil burning power plant planned for Burrillville.

In Raimondo’s capacity as vice chair of the Governors’ Wind Energy Coalition she was proud to “support the foresight of my colleagues to broaden the Coalition’s focus and include solar energy development as a policy priority. Wind and solar provide complementary benefits to the U.S. electric grid and will help diversify the country’s energy mix. The need for states to take a broader view of renewable power is clear.”

Again, no mention of her support for fracked gas.

Raimondo has consistently touted her support for renewables like wind and solar, only occasionally voicing her support for fracking. Raimondo never holds a press release in front of a fracked gas pipeline or compressor station. She holds them at wind turbines and solar farms, giving the appearance of a strong leader on the environment.

But National Grid and Invenergy need to know she’s on board with their plans, so she signals her support during the press conference with careful phrasing.

And if the governor’s phrasing is off message, National Grid’s Michael Ryan will misquote her. “Clean” energy is out, “reliable” energy is in. In other words, “Let them eat fracked gas.”

Raimondo’s choice of location for her press conferences demonstrates that if she is not embarrassed by her support of fracked gas, she at least is beginning to recognize how history will ultimately judge her support.

As Bill McKibben said in a recent message to Rhode Island, “Five to ten years ago we thought the transition was going to be from coal, to natural gas as some sort of bridge fuel, onto renewables and now, sadly, we realize we can’t do that in good faith, because natural gas… turns out to be a dead end, not a bridge to the future but a kind of rickety pier built out into the lake of hydrocarbons.”

Fracked gas was well known to be a bad idea when Raimondo stood with Invenergy’s CEO Michael Polsky and tried to sell the idea to Rhode Island. Raimondo’s support for Invenergy’s power plant was a massive political blunder with consequences not only for her political career, but for the future of Rhode Island and the world.

A future, and a world, her children will be living in.

Climate change

The PPP poll of 1,179 likely Rhode Island primary voters found that 53 percent of Rhode Islanders were “much more likely” to “vote for a candidate who believes the United States must do all it can to lessen our dependence on fossil fuels by embracing measures like solar, wind, and renewable fuels, like biofuels,” and 22 percent “somewhat more likely” to support such a candidate. Only 26 percent of Rhode Islanders don’t want to support a climate champion for elected office with 11 percent “somewhat less likely” to support such a candidate, 7 percent were “much less likely” and 8 percent said it wouldn’t make a difference.

Even a majority of Rhode Island Republicans want to support a climate champion, the PPP poll found. A total of 63 percent of Republicans were more likely to support a candidate who would decrease dependence on fossil fuels, with 37 percent much more likely and 26 percent somewhat more likely. For Republicans, 27 percent were less likely to vote for a candidate who would invest in alternative energy and 10 percent of Democrats.

The PPP survey parsed its climate change question in terms of fossil fuels contributing to terrorism. It asked: “You may have heard about a connection between fossil fuels and terrorism. Even though the US doesn’t buy oil directly from regimes hostile to us and our allies, our demand for oil does drive up world prices, which benefits hostile regimes. Knowing this, would you be much more likely, somewhat more likely, somewhat less likely, or much less likely to vote for a candidate who believes the United States must do all it can to lessen our dependence on fossil fuels by embracing measures like solar, wind, and renewable fuels, like biofuels?”

Cannabis

The Brown poll posed a more straight-forward question about marijuana. “Thinking beyond medical marijuana, do you support or oppose changing the law in Rhode Island to regulate and tax the use of marijuana, similarly to alcohol,” it asked.

Much of Rhode Island does, with 55 percent answering yes. 21 percent strongly support taxing and regulating cannabis and another 34 percent support it. Only 4 percent were neutral, 24 percent oppose the idea and 12 percent strongly oppose ending prohibition. 5 percent said they didn’t know or refused to answer.

Young Rhode Islanders overwhelmingly want marijuana to be legal, with 72 percent of people age 18 to 44 supporting the idea. Older Rhode Islanders were evenly split with 42.9 percent supporting legalization and 42.1 percent opposed. 56.3 percent of people age 45 to 64 support it and 37.7 percent are opposed.

The poll showed people were more likely to support regulating cannabis like alcohol the more education and income they had.

It also showed that white people were both more likely to support and oppose legalization than black people. 55 percent of white people polled said they support legalization and 36 percent were opposed compared with 50 percent of black respondents who support it and 30 percent who are opposed. Conversely black respondents were more than twice as likely as whites to either refuse to answer or remain neutral.

In granting the youth a remedy, Judge Hill noted the extraordinary circumstances of the climate crisis, saying, “this is an urgent situation…these kids can’t wait.” The court discussed the catastrophic impacts of climate destabilization globally, including the impending loss of polar bears and low-lying countries like Bangladesh. The court explained that while it had no jurisdiction outside of Washington state, it did have jurisdiction over Ecology and would order the agency to comply with the law and do its part to address the crisis.

After a landmark November, 2015 decision, in which Judge Hill found that the state has a “mandatory duty” to “preserve, protect, and enhance the air quality for the current and future generations,” and found the state’s current standards to fail that standard dramatically, Ecology nonetheless unilaterally withdrew its proposed rule to reduce carbon emissions in the state in February, just months after Judge Hill specifically underscored the urgency of the climate crisis.

“It was absurd for Ecology to withdraw its proposed rule to reduce carbon emissions,” said petitioner Aji Piper, who is also a plaintiff on the federal constitutional climate lawsuit, supported by Our Children’s Trust. “Especially after Judge Hill declared last fall that our ‘very survival depends upon the will of [our] elders to act now…to stem the tide of global warming.’ I think Ecology should be ashamed by its reversal of potentially powerful action and today, Judge Hill issued a significant ruling that should go down in history books. Our government must act to protect our climate for benefit of us and future generations.”

“For the first time, a U.S. court not only recognized the extraordinary harms young people are facing due to climate change, but ordered an agency to do something about it,” said Andrea Rodgers, the Western Environmental Law Center attorney representing the youths. “Ecology is now court-ordered to issue a rule that fulfills its constitutional and public trust duty to ensure Washington does its part to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect the planet.”

“This case explains why youth around this country, and in several other countries, are forced to bring their governments to court to secure a healthy atmosphere and stable climate,” said Julia Olson, executive director and chief legal counsel at Our Children’s Trust. “Despite clear scientific evidence and judicial recognition of the urgency of the climate crisis, Washington and most governments across the U.S. and other countries are failing to take correspondingly urgent, science-based action. That failure unfairly consigns youth to a disproportionately bleak future against which they can only reasonably ask the courts to step in to address this most time sensitive issue of our time.”

“This is a massive victory,” said petitioner Gabe Mandell.

Related cases brought by youth to protect the atmosphere are pending before other U.S. courts in the federal district court in Oregon, and in the state courts of North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Massachusetts and Oregon.

This is a press release of:

• Our Children’s Trust is a nonprofit organization, elevating the voice of youth, those with most to lose, to secure the legal right to a healthy atmosphere and stable climate on behalf of present and future generations. We lead a global human rights and environmental justice campaign to implement enforceable science-based Climate Recovery Plans that will return atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration to levels below 350 ppm.
• The Western Environmental Law Center (WELC) is a public interest nonprofit law firm. WELC combines legal skills with sound conservation biology and environmental science to address major environmental issues throughout the West. WELC does not charge clients and partners for services, but relies instead on charitable gifts from individuals, families, and foundations to accomplish its mission.

She describes her vision of transforming Rhode Island into a national leader in sustainability and resilient-related industries in a new document called the Grow Green Jobs Report, which lays out a vision for Rhode Island’s economy that would closely mirror ideas being implemented in her hometown. Last week, Newport officials testified at the House Commission on Economic Impacts of Flooding and Sea Rise about how the City-by-the-Sea is poised to both suffer and benefit from rising oceans.

“The Rhode Island Senate has identified the green sector of the economy as one that offers great opportunity for both job growth and environmental benefits,” the Grow Green Jobs Report says. “As the Ocean State, our economy and people have experienced the impacts of severe storms, rising sea levels and warming temperatures. We have the workforce and educational assets to build upon – to turn these challenging events into opportunities for a stronger economy and a more resilient state.”

Paiva Weed is leading a round table discussion today at 2pm in the Senate Lounge. “Participants will include the Chambers of Commerce, DEM, Office of Energy Resources, DLT, Resource Recovery, Department of Education, Higher Ed, Build RI, and others from the environmental community and green industries,” said Senate spokesman Greg Pare in an email.

The legislation that accompanies the report is expected to be filed today, Pare said. The policy recommendations in the report give an idea of what the legislation will include:

1. Expand Real Jobs RI’s planning and implementation grants to include green industries.
2. The Governor’s Workforce Board should create workforce training programs to support well-paying clean energy jobs, including establishing career pathways and internships to ensure accessibility at all income levels.
3. Incentivize the creation and expansion of STEM/STEAM into all Rhode Island elementary and secondary schools, including certificate and pathways to higher education degree programs to prepare students in green technologies.
4. Encourage our public higher education institutions to partner with green sector businesses to identify areas of job demand and to develop certificate and degree programs in a public report.
5. Encourage our public higher education institutions to further develop degree programs leading to employment in the areas of climate change risk evaluation, sustainability, resiliency and adaptation.
6. Extend the Renewable Energy Standard (RES) that provides for annual increases in the percentage of electricity from renewable sources that National Grid supplies to its customers.
7. Incentivize in-state generation of renewable energy by expanding the Renewable Energy Growth (REG) Program, ensuring that more jobs and the economic benefits of renewable energy stay in Rhode Island.
8. Implement an efficiency program for delivered fuels customers, adding construction jobs and assisting households with oil and propane fuel costs.
9. Expand the RES to include renewable thermal technologies, such as geothermal heating and biofuels, which produce energy for heating, cooling or humidity control.
10. Institute policies that will reduce the price of solar installation and support the anticipated five-fold increase in solar power over the next decade.
11. Implement a streamlined statewide permitting program that removes unnecessary regulatory barriers, resulting in a predictable and less costly process for solar developers.
12. Establish statewide property tax standards for small residential and commercial solar projects.
13. Reinstate a state incentive for the installation of residential renewable energy systems.
14. Rhode Island Commerce Corporation should provide specific job development incentives to companies that process and add value to Rhode Island’s agricultural and seafood products. The increased demand for local farm grown products will create additional production and logistics jobs.
15. The Office of Regulatory Reform should work with state agencies and business representatives to review existing regulations that apply to Rhode Island plant-based industries and agriculture, identifying opportunities to coordinate across agencies and simplifying rules that apply to these businesses.
16. Task Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) with submitting an economic impact study of Rhode Island’s solid waste industries (recycling, reuse, trash hauling, recycling food waste, composting) to identify the most effective ways to develop jobs related to increased recycling in Rhode Island.
17. Establish a goal to increase recycling to at least 50% of the state’s solid waste stream by 2025 and direct RIRRC to develop strategies to achieve that goal.

News broke that a “historic” deal had been stuck in Paris by the largest gathering of states in human history at the COP21 United Nations conference meant to address climate change. Yet despite the self-congratulation, adulation from the lame-stream press, and over-glorified silliness, activists and scientists were adamant that the whole affair was simply a gigantic ruse, with Friends of the Earth International (FEI) calling the agreement “a sham”.

“Rich countries have moved the goal posts so far that we are left with a sham of a deal in Paris. Through piecemeal pledges and bullying tactics, rich countries have pushed through a very bad deal,” said Sara Shaw, Friends of the Earth International climate justice and energy coordinator. Dipti Bhatnagar, Friends of the Earth International climate justice and energy coordinator, said “Vulnerable and affected people deserve better than this failed agreement; they are the ones who feel the worst impacts of our politicians’ failure to take tough enough action.”

At the core of the deal currently being touted as a success are the following policy goals:

• Limit global temperature rise to 2*C (3.6*F), if not 1.5*C
• Limit greenhouse gas emissions beginning somewhere between 2050 and 2100
• Review of each state’s contribution every five years
• Rich countries will finance adaptation to climate change and transfer to a renewable energy grid in poorer ones

Yet as Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! reported all week from the City of Love, the agreement has always been lacking several key elements. It fails to protect women and indigenous peoples and does not include a mechanism allowing for states to claim damages from the large polluter nations and corporations that have already affected millions of lives with climate change. Consider what Dr. Bill Nye told The Huffington Post at the beginning of the month about how climate change had caused the war in Syria:

The news is filled weekly with stories of natural disasters, exacerbated by climate change, that cause cataclysmic events throughout the world. And when one considers that it has recently been revealed that the Exxon oil company knew in the 1970s that climate change existed and was caused by the burning of fossil fuels, one can easily see a clear-cut case of industrial malfeasance that resulted in catastrophic consequences for the population, not unlike the case of tobacco companies, especially since both the petroleum and tobacco companies intentionally misled the public about the harmful affects of their products. This would create the opportunity for governments throughout the world to file massive class-action lawsuits against the oil companies and even perhaps the nation states that aided and abetted this cover-up. Furthermore, as reported on Democracy Now! when Goodman interviewed Dr. Kevin Anderson, things are far worse than the public believes.

Well, those of us who look at the—running between the science and then translating that into what that means for policymakers, what we are afraid of doing is putting forward analysis that questions the sort of economic paradigm, the economic way that we run society today. So, we think—actually, we don’t question that. So what we do is we fine-tune our analysis so it fits within a sort of a—the political and economic framing of society, the current political and economic framing. So we don’t really say that—actually, our science now asks fundamental questions about this idea of economic growth in the short term, and we’re very reluctant to say that. In fact, the funding bodies often are reluctant to fund research that raises those questions. So the whole setup, not just the scientists, the research community around it that funds the research, the journalists, events like this, we’re all being—we’re all deliberately being slightly sort of self-delusional. We all know the situation is much more severe than we’re prepared to voice openly. And we all know this. So it is a—this is a collective sort of façade, a mask that we have. [Emphasis added]

How bad is it? Consider this recent article in Science Daily. A rise of 6*C in ocean temperatures, something that could happen by the end of the century, would cause phytoplankton to stop photosynthesizing. These phytoplankton are responsible for 2/3 of the planet’s oxygen, which would cause the planet’s air to have a massive drop in oxygen content, resulting in a massive die-off of animals and humans, something not dreamed of seriously perhaps since John of Patmos delivered his Book of Revelations.

Now consider also recent developments regarding the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The deal, revealed recently to massive outrage, would severely impact the ability to file class-action lawsuits against corporations and entities over consumer safety issues. Poorer nations, especially those island nations in the Pacific Ocean that face massive land loss within the next fifty years, should be able to sue for damages. Yet instead, the COP21 agreement foists onto these nations proposals for a neoliberal loan package that will entail greater hegemony for capital, parasitical debt resulting in cuts to vital social services, and no protection for those most impacted by climate change and who find themselves on the front lines of the battle. It as if an arsonist were to light your house on fire and then offer to sell you a garden hose to put the blaze out with a caveat that you become their indentured servant for an unspecified amount of time!

To quote the Bard at this point seems almost cliche. Yet I cannot help but recall the words of Cassius:

Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonorable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves

To fast is absurd. This is true especially for someone like me who doesn’t believe anything absent systemic, revolutionary change will do much good.

Yes, I had read Lee’s testimony; it sums up my feelings.

This is what Steve wrote about his experience occupying the Sidewalk at the FERC Gates of Hell:

Being here, eating no food for 18 days, has taken me down a fascinating and disorienting rabbit hole, where “normal” appears absurd and even suicidal, and where unrealistic may be our only way out. I recall hearing Starhawk saying something like this many years ago. “The time for reasonable is past,” she said. But I have struggled to make sense of this. The fast is a journey into unreasonable.

The other day was hot on the sidewalk in front of FERC, I was talking with a guy I dislike – he dominates conversation and is loud and bombastic. He mentioned something about money in the middle of our conversation, but I got so tired of him after 15 minutes I got up and, so as not to appear impolite, distributed fliers to passersby on the sidewalk. He continued talking to another faster, but when he decided to leave, I asked if he was serious about donating money. He hemmed and hawed, but we talked for a minute about the $1000 BXE wanted to give to Lincoln Temple, the very poor African American Church which generously has been providing us space for sleeping. He left, and I forgot about him. But half an hour later he returned and gave me an envelope with $1000 in cash. “Use this for whatever BXE needs.” We’ve given it to the minister of Lincoln Temple.

On Thursday twenty year old Berenice Tomkins, a college student, went into the “open” FERC commissioners meeting, which does not allow public comment. The five polished FERC Commissioners are the corrupt decision makers in this powerful regulatory agency which makes life and death decisions for communities and people all over the country. Most of us are not allowed entry because we have disrupted meetings in the past, but this was Berenice’s first time, so she got in. She wasn’t sure what to do and waited through the incomprehensible conversations of the Commissioners, which in a coded language talk about decisions already made behind closed doors. When they started talking about forest fire mitigation she could no longer hold her tongue. She stood up and with a twenty year old’s strong voice took over the meeting: ” What are you talking about? It’s your policies which are creating the climate crisis, and you can’t mitigate the fires without talking about the climate crisis!” She talked for a minute or so until until FERC Security grabbed her arm and dragged her out. She was crying and proud as she came out.

The brave people of BXE need our love and support, they and all others who put their lives on the line to expose the ecocidal and communicidal crimes of our federal and state governments in support of their sponsors on Wall Street: No New Fracked-Gas Power Plant in Burrillville, RI!

Please join us at the People’s House in Providence tomorrow—come and hear the what motivates some of our local fasters in Rhode Island.

Help us avoid this:

The paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks and everything sown by the brooks shall wither, be driven away, and be no more.

Maybe it’s not too late yet.

“You can’t negotiate with a beetle. You are now dealing with natural law. And if you don’t understand natural law, you will soon.”

Oren Lyons, a member of the Onandaga Council of Chiefs, quoted by Mary Christina Wood in her book Nature’s Trust, sums up what’s wrong with our self-absorbed political system and its failure to deal with our planetary climate emergency in referring to four million acres of Canadian forest wiped out by beetles now thriving in warmer winter temperatures as a result of global warming.

Maybe Gina was doing the hard work of making sure that Providence will not be left behind, as—in city after city—we build what Frank Deford calls “Athletic Taj Mahals,” monuments for the “filthy rich.”  Thanks, Frank; you nailed it: Spending Public Money On Sports Stadiums Is Bad Business.   But do not forget that Gina is an honorable person; so are they all, all honorable people.

We The People who do not revolt against systemic corruption are the problem.

Since August 31, I’ve been trying to make an appointment with Gina to deliver a basic physics message.  It took until September 13 before I got a reply: “Once again, thank you again for being in touch,”  pretty pathetic writing that I should have received within three seconds rather than after two weeks, but no appointment.

The web site of the Office of the Governor is totally dysfunctional, but, dear reader, I’ll spare you details.  I just wonder, why should we trust people to run a state if they cannot manage a web site?  Of course, the problem in Rhode Island is not small-scale incompetence; broken democracy is what we are dealing with, but it’s not Gina, for Gina is an honorable person; so are they all, all honorable people.

Pia Ward, my dear friend, is the engaged artist who made the black-and-white photographs in this post.  Pia and I went to Gina’s office on Wednesday to deliver a pizza, a lunch skipped in support of Beyond Extreme Energy’s No-New-Permits fast in DC.

Of course we were told that web site was not the way to make appointments with the governor.  We have to follow procedures, no matter how many people have their lives destroyed or put their lives on the line in DC and elsewhere in the nation.  We are but a nuisance and who cares about Terry Greenwood?

One of Gina’s aids, who dutifully took notes of our story, instructed us that I had to go home and to make an appointment I had to send an email to the gubernatorial scheduler, Kelly Harris (Kelly-Harris@governor.ri.gov).  Never mind that we were already at the State House; the important work for corporate America and the filthy rich should never be interrupted, for they are all, all honorable people.

Report from the No-New-Permits fast in DC

Ted Glick of ChessapeakeClimate.org and one of the Beyond Extreme Energy water-only fasters in DC had the following exchange with Norman Bay, the chairman of Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).  Ted asked if the chairman would come down to receive the five copies of the Pope’s encyclical, Laudato Si’, on September 25th at noon. Bay said he would consider it.  We all know what that means, but let Ted speak:

Then he stopped and we looked each other in the eye. He told me that he respected what we were doing with the fast and the commitment it showed as far as our beliefs. He said he felt this type of action was a good type of action.

However, he went on to say that he really had problems with us disrupting their monthly meetings and asked if we would stop doing that.

I responded: “How can we do that when there’s no change at FERC as far as permitting gas pipelines and fracking infrastructure, one after the other, with virtually no exceptions.”

His response: “These are just pipelines. We’re a regulatory agency. Blaming us is like blaming the steel companies that make pipes. It’s the production of the gas that you need to deal with.”

Keep up the disruption, my friends; irritation makes pearls. Dear reader, if you ever have to explain Hannah Arendt’s “banality of evil,” this exchange would be a perfect starting point.

Events for the rest of our fast

Following up on the pledge to do three Ramadan-style fasts centered on each event in RI, Wednesday’s visit to the State House got Beatrijs, my wife, and me restarted fasting on Tuesday, after a one-day interruption. The following will get us to Friday, the 25th, when Beyond Extreme Energy will end its fast:

• Peace Fest RI, Kennedy Plaza, Saturday, September 19, 2015, 1:30pm-4;30pm
• Rally for People, Peace and Planet
• URI International Day of Peace on the Quad 10am-3pm

Of course, it’s not too late to call Gina’s friends at Invenergy to tell them that fracked gas is not clean and that they should cancel the fracked-gas power plant proposed for Burrillville.  Just keep in mind that Gina signed a contract with Invenergy, but Gina is an honorable person; so are they all, all honorable people.  We The People are the problem, we who think that the next fully-scripted ElecToon will bring system change.

Oh, yes, how about that pizza we took to the Gina’s office? As anticipated, it ended up feeding hungry people on Kennedy Plaza.

The Green Party of Rhode Island welcomed presidential candidate Jill Stein to their 2015 Green Gathering held at the Warwick campus of CCRI. Stein spoke for about 35 minutes about her campaign, her vision for the future of America, and the need for a new political party that represents ‘people, planet and peace over profit.’

Stein praised the Rhode Island Green Party for their environmental effort against fracked gas. “You’ve all been an incredible inspiration,’ she said. “With the sustainability leadership that’s been coming out of Rhode Island and your amazing leadership on the pipeline resistance and starting the five state coalition of Green parties to fight pipelines together.”

This is, said Stein, “a moment of crisis, but also a moment of potential for deep systemic change… Half of Americans don’t identify as Democrats or Republicans right now.”

Stein feels that the success of Bernie Sanders is a sign of America’s dissatisfaction with the two party system, but she feels Sanders’ campaign for the presidency is doomed to fail. “What they are not counting on is the basic structure of the Democratic party… the Democratic party has a built in structure for sabotaging that revolt.”

As examples, Stein brought up the presidential campaigns of Howard Dean, Jesse Jackson and Dennis Kucinich who were all sabotaged from within the Democratic Party.

Also, says Stein, there’s Super Tuesday, a big money primary that requires a huge amount of cash to win, since a candidate has to cover 25 states with advertising. Sanders will be hopelessly outspent here. But even if Sanders were to get through these hurdles, he still has to face the super delegates, created after George McGovern won the nomination, and they control half of the Democratic Party’s votes.

Sanders has promised to support the winner of the Democratic primary, so he’s taking all that positive radical energy and either giving it to the Democrats or destroying it. The Greens, on the other hand, won’t disappear come November. “We are building a permanent force for people planning for peace over profit,” says Stein, “We are here to develop a political party that supports that agenda.”

“As Bernie begins to run into trouble there are going to be a lot of unhappy campers…” says Stein, and as Sanders brings his people into the Democratic party presidential campaign of someone like Hillary Clinton, he’ll be working against his own agenda.

The Democratic Party will combat the agenda of the rebels who want to keep the party from shifting to the right. Democrats in the Sanders camp will need a Plan B if Sanders doesn’t win. Plan B for Sanders supporters is the Green party, says Stein.

“We are facing an unprecedented crisis right now across the spectrum of economy, ecology, peace and democracy,” said Stein. During the last economic crisis, with a Democratic president and both houses controlled by Democrats, the priority was Wall St. Homeowners didn’t get a bailout. Wall St. did.

“Enough with the lesser evil, it’s time to stand up for the greater good.” The Greens, Stein said, “really do represent basic American values and basic American sentiment…

“When we go into debates, we usually win them… That’s why they work so darn hard to keep us out of the debates.” Stein went on to talk about how when she was running for governor of Massachusetts, she had to fight to get on the televised debate, and afterwards the “instant online viewer polling” said that she had won. She was not allowed in the debates after that.

The Greens, teaming with the Libertarian Party, are trying to get into the debates this year. They have two court cases pending, they’re working on a petition to change the rules about who can participate in the debates and they’re planning to boycott the sponsors of the  Commission on Presidential Debates. This is a real attempt to change the political climate, and the two big parties are fighting against this.

Speaking of Libertarians, Stein says they are a “work in progress.”

“The more they learn about politics, the more the they’re converting from Libertarians to Greens… Libertarians are often people who get that there’s a problem but they haven’t quite discovered what the solution is yet… we have many things in common around foreign policy, the drug wars here at home and protecting our civil liberties.”

The Greens will be the only party on the ballot saying, “Not only do young people deserve free public higher education, that should be a birth right, but we’re saying, ‘we bailed out the friggin’ bankers, who got us into this mess… isn’t it time to bail out the students who were the victims of that waste, fraud and abuse?’” says Stein, “Forty million millennials who are mobilized to come out and vote to abolish debt…that can actually win the election.”

Stein also talked about the environment, and the terrible threat of climate change. She referenced the new study from James Hanson, which shows that sea level rise by 2050 may reach ten feet, effectively putting large parts of the world under water. (What this means for the Ocean State, as we plan heavy investments into fracked gas over the next thirty years, is disaster.)

“What this means is stop what you’re doing,” says Stein, “Let’s join the team to stop this, immediately… In stopping this, we can actually start a whole new way forward. A new way forward based on peace, justice, democracy and sustainability.

“These things go together. We put them together in the phrase, ‘People, planet and peace over profit.’”

Stein praised the growing movements for human rights and climate justice, such as Black Lives Matter, but she wants these various movements to unite into a powerful political force. “They want us to be divided into our separate issues… but by coming together around a unified agenda of ‘People, planet and peace over profit,’ then we are unstoppable.”

The Republican Party is a radical, fringe movement, says Stein. The Democrats aren’t much better. People want something new. “People are actually supporting a Green New Deal, spending half a trillion dollars a year to make the emergency transition” from fossil fuels.

The Green Party has popular support for its policies. “We have the Green New Deal, we’ve got health care as a human right, we have the right to a job, we have living wages, we have cutting the military…”

Speaking of the military, Stein makes the point that it’s American imperialism, fueled by an addiction to oil and the sale of arms, that keeps us in the Middle was, spending trillions and killing hundreds of thousands while we create the next Al Qaeda or ISIS. “How about an arms boycott to the Middle East?’ asked Stein, to applause.

“We could put twenty million people to work right now… to transition us to one hundred percent clean renewable energy by 2030. We are the only campaign that is calling for a specific ‘time over.’” said Stein, “We can’t really address the climate crisis without addressing the economic crisis.”

Action on the climate will have immediate and positive health effects, the savings from which will pay for the transition itself.

“This is our moment. This is what we have been preparing a lifetime for. The solutions are in our hands. There is a political vacuum that is waiting to be filled. Democracy is in our hands. Justice is in our hands. A survivable climate is in our hands. It’s up to us, so join the team, I look forward to working with you and having the campaign of a lifetime. We have all of our lives to change, and to change the course of history. So let’s do it together.”

Peter Nightingale, a University of Rhode Island physics professor and occasional RI Future contributor, and Curt Nordgaard, a pediatrician from Massachusetts, were both arrested according to Fighting Against Natural Gas, of FANG, the grassroots group of activists who have been calling attention to the Algonquin pipeline project that would cut through northern Rhode Island.

“I’m taking action today because as a parent and a being pediatrician compels me to use any and all nonviolent means to stop this project,” said Nordgaard in a prepared statement.

Journalist Steve Ahlquist was on the scene and recorded the direct action and subsequent arrests:

This is the latest in increasingly disruptive tactics by FANG to raise awareness of the negative environmental impacts associated with continued investments in fossil fuels like methane gas, which is often captured through fracking. A tree sitter was removed from a stand by police in July and Nightingale was arrested in December for refusing to leave Senator Sheldon Whitehouse’s office because the climate change champion would not speak against the pipeline project. FANG has also held more traditional protest events.

“We will keep taking action until these projects are stopped” Nightingale said in a statement.