Climate Change

Breaking: Our campaigners scale a giant oil rig off the Shetland Islands

Posted by jamie — 21 September 2010 at 11:31am - Comments

Greenpeace activist Victor, hanging off Chevron's Stena Carron rig

A few moments ago, our activists started taking action against a massive oil platform, stopping it from drilling a deep water well off the Shetland Islands.

Using speedboats to reach the huge 228m long drill ship, they climbed up the giant rungs of the anchor chain, and are now preventing the ship from moving to its drill site.

It all started two days ago, when a handful of activists slipped off the Esperanza - which we knew would be monitored - and boarded a ferry in Aberdeen bound for Lerwick in the Shetland Islands.

Then this morning, at a sign that the drill ship was about to move, they started the action.

Listen!

Victor, one of the climbers, describes what it's like on the Stena Carron's anchor chain

The ship is operated by oil giant Chevron, and was due to sail for a site 200km north of the Shetland Islands and drill a well in 500 metres of water.

More than 10,000 of us have sent an email to Chris Huhne - the Energy Secretary - calling for a moratorium on deepwater drilling in UK waters. On top of that, last month we sent a letter to the government threatening legal action in an effort to stop the granting of new permits for deep water drilling.

But it's not enough. Deepwater drilling is continuing unabated.

We saw what happened in the Gulf of Mexico only a few months ago. The world's biggest oil spill - a direct consequence of reckless deepwater drilling. It's time we go beyond oil and stop gambling with our environment and the climate.

Follow the latest at GoBeyondOil.org and find out how you too can take action.

Article tagged as: chevron, climate change, direct actions, go beyond oil, oil, shetland

Pressure builds for green delivery at Lib Dem conference

Posted by jossc — 21 September 2010 at 8:41am - Comments

Under pressure: Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne © CC/David Spender

Climate campaigner Louise Hutchins reports from the Liberal Democrat party conference:

Here in Liverpool amongst the Lib Dem faithful, there is a mood of embattled determination to give their leaders the benefit of the doubt – for now. There's also a keen awareness that delivery on some of the party's touchstone issues is urgently needed to stem the haemorrhaging of support seen in opinion polls.

Article tagged as: climate change, liberal democrats, party conferences, polling

Getting people on board in Aberdeen

Posted by jamess — 19 September 2010 at 5:37pm - Comments

"I've always wanted to meet someone from Greenpeace. Are you one of those nutters who climbs stuff?"

"Unfortunately not." I had to explain sheepishly to Paul – my newfound friend in Old Blackfriar's, an Aberdeen pub – that not all of us at Greenpeace are daring heroes who can nimble up Arctic oil rigs.

Behind those taking action in front of the camera, there are loads of others in the background: from cooks to deckhands, from radio operators to - in my case - web geeks. Together, we're a veritable army of activists.

Article tagged as: aberdeen, climate change, go beyond oil, oil, oil drilling, scotland

Got oil in your pension?

Posted by jamie — 16 September 2010 at 5:23pm - Comments

Watch this animation to find out how your pension money could be bankrolling destructive oil companies like BP - and what you can do about it.

Many of the world's most popular pension funds are deep in dirty oil. If you've got oil in yours, you're not alone, but it also means that collectively, we've got the power to influence our pension funds to shift the big oil companies to clean energy.

Article tagged as: BP, climate change, go beyond oil, pensions

It's our birthday and we'll go beyond oil if we want to

Posted by lisavickers — 15 September 2010 at 4:58pm - Comments

The first Greenpeace ship - the Phyllis Cormack - in 1971 © Greenpeace / Robert Keziere

Today is the 39th birthday of Greenpeace and we have just arrived in Aberdeen on the Esperanza. Back in 1971 on September 15th, the first Greenpeace ship set sail to protest against a US nuclear test zone and peacefully prevent the destruction of Amchitka, a pristine island ecosystem off the coast of Alaska. They didn't make it all the way to Amchitka but what followed was a wave of public support that ultimately shut down the US nuclear testing program, won Amchitka designation as a wildlife sanctuary and gave birth to the Greenpeace movement.

Serendipitously, we have just returned to the UK on Greenpeace's birthday from a mission to the Arctic where we peacefully stopped offshore drilling for 40 hours to minimise the chances of an oil strike before drilling stops for the winter. But while Cairn Energy continues dangerous drilling in the Arctic, we're hoping that together with our supporters we've helped to catalyse the movement to go beyond oil.

Article tagged as: amchitka, arctic, cairn energy, climate change, esperanza, go beyond oil, oil

Tarnished Earth: the devastating power of tar sands

Posted by jamie — 15 September 2010 at 4:42pm - Comments

If you're on London's South Bank over the next few weeks, watch out for a new open air exhibition featuring the work of regular Greenpeace photographer Jiri Rezac. He's been to the tar sands works in Canada and the images he's brought back clearly show the extent of the devastation caused by this insane venture to both the environment and local populations.

The slideshow above is just a taste of Jiri's work featured in the exhibition which you can see near City Hall by Tower Bridge until 14 October. It will then be touring around the UK - details are still to be confirmed but check the Tarnished Earth website for updates.

Article tagged as: canada, climate change, photography, slideshows, tar sands

Ice ice baby

Posted by lisavickers — 10 September 2010 at 11:29pm - Comments

We're now in the Atlantic Ocean heading for Europe - escorted by sea gulls gliding alongside us as the swells rock us from side to side.

Article tagged as: climate change, esperanza, go beyond oil, oil, ships

Captain's Blog: New generation

Posted by lisavickers — 9 September 2010 at 4:40pm - Comments

Waldermar, captain of the Esperanza, writes about his personal motivations for bringing the ship to the Arctic...

I'm from South America, the land of the Incas, the Guaraníes, the Wichis, the Tobas, the Mapuches, the Onas, and other native nations.

Article tagged as: arctic, climate change, esperanza, go beyond oil, oil

Behind the scenes of the oil rig action

Posted by jamie — 9 September 2010 at 3:43pm - Comments

Belatedly, here's a video from the Esperanza featuring climbing superstar Sim, one of the four activists who scaled Cairn Energy's rig last week. As well as revealing Sim's personal reasons for wanting to stop the drilling, there are some spectacular shots from the action itself.

Article tagged as: cairn energy, climate change, direct action, energy, go beyond oil, greenland, oil, videos

Turbines are go! British wind power hits record levels

Posted by jossc — 8 September 2010 at 4:55pm - Comments

Great news - Britain's wind farms generated record levels of power on Monday, providing 5 per cent of all power supplied to the National Grid over the course of the day.

The Grid confirmed that 40.5GWh out of a total 809.5GWh was provided by wind farms over the 24-hour period, with wind output peaking at 1,860 megawatts at 8.30pm.

A National Grid spokesperson said that, including direct output from turbines not conected to the grid, "about 10 per cent of total electricity demand would have been met by wind power. It is a pretty big landmark for the industry."

Article tagged as: climate change, energy, offshore wind, wind farms, wind power

Greenpeace UK