Category: Action

Friday, September 20th, hundreds of young people and adults, including students and teachers from Proctor Academy, converged on Veterans Park in Manchester to take part in the first-ever Manchester Youth Climate Strike. Stonyfield Farm supported the event by giving away yogurt at the park, and people took selfies with Climate Warrior frames.

Ana Maria from Manchester said of the event, “The Global Youth Climate Strike is a great example of the power of the people to come together and take action for a cause that we all believe in; the preservation of this planet.  The Manchester Climate Strike was a huge success, but it alone will not stop climate change. We have to harness the energy we witnessed and shared and create an ongoing movement against those who are actively profiting from destroying our planet and the lives of our people.  Capitalism is the reason we and our earth are all suffering and only we as a unified mass movement of working-class and oppressed people can put an end to it.  I feel immensely honored to have taken part in organizing the Manchester Climate Strike and I’m certain that progressive mass movements will continue to develop in our communities”.

“Manchester is striking because the city does not need the Granite Bridge Pipeline transporting fracked methane gas along Lake Massabesic, threatening their water supply.  With projects like that in the works, it is clear that New Hampshire is not on the path to 100% clean, safe, renewable energy.  We are fighting to stop this harmful pipeline project and to shut down the last major coal-fired power plant in New Hampshire. We call on our elected officials to publicly oppose the Granite Bridge Pipeline project and to endorse the Green New Deal”, said Pipeline Resistance Organizer Jennifer Dube with 350NH.

Sixteen-year-old student Sofia Mendes said, “We cannot wait to take action because what we do in the next decade will determine the future of our planet.  Today we are showing these politicians that climate change is our top priority and we refuse to be silent until solutions that every citizen can participate in have been put into action until plastic bags are gone, machines run on natural resources, and the pH in the oceans stop rising each year. I want to grow up.  I want to go to college, to have children, and I want them to see this beautiful world one day.  Every generation faces a new challenge and this one is ours.”

“I would say that we’re running out of time, but the truth is that low-income communities, Black and brown communities, and indigenous communities have long been bearing the brunt of climate change and environmental injustices.  We cannot fully address the climate crisis without climate justice.  That’s why in this moment, we must center communities, like right here in Manchester, in our action”, said Braxton Brewington.

“Mayor Joyce Craig, I really appreciate what you’ve done for our city. You’ve brought new businesses in, revitalized downtown life, demonstrated compassion for our transitional and addicted neighbors, and secured millions in grants for public education.  I was so excited to be able to vote for you again this past Tuesday.  Everything I mentioned about Manchester previously can be mostly attributed to your work over the past two years.  With that said I am calling on you Mayor Craig, to support our city’s future and take a stand with us against the Granite Bridge Pipeline.  Manchester does NOT want more fracked gas in our city – or shipped off to ANY other community.  We will NOT tolerate the poisoning of our water supply. We need you to come along with us as we lead our state into a future of sustainable energy.  Manchester is more than capable of being the city to take that on”, said Alissandra Rodriguez-Murray, Regional Organizer with Rights & Democracy NH.

Katherine Leswing, a teacher and mother from Concord said “We must elect politicians who prioritize clean energy and don’t veto it, politicians who oppose building new pipelines for fossil fuels, and politicians who are behind shutting down the Merrimack Station Power Plant in Bow – the last operating coal plant in New England without a closing date. Politicians and their families will not escape the impacts of the global climate crisis, because WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER!”

“I just have a few words to say. Reduce, reuse, REFUSE, recycle, and please save the planet”, pleaded Myrica Palm-Bechtel, third grade.

Later after marching to City Hall, children left behind lasting messages with chalk art, while protesters were given a call-to-action to shut down the Merrimack Generating Station, the last large coal plant in New England without a shutdown date.

A photo and video gallery account of the People’s Climate March in Washington DC and New Hampshire.

Find more photos here.

Yesterday I marched with 200 others in the biggest climate rally New Hampshire has ever seen. Our action in Portsmouth showed me the potential of our state to speak up for climate justice.

Sure, we enjoyed the music, art and energy of the action. But we are motivated by something bigger.

I am motivated by love and compassion for those who are feeling the first wave of impacts of the climate crisis. There’s so much at stake, I see the climate crisis as an opportunity to address the deeper problems of injustice in our society. That’s why I’m a part of 350NH. Together, we can create the movement that will actualize our vision for a just, stable, and life-giving future.

I was born in 1995.  18 years after Exxon knew that burning fossil fuels would cause global warming, super storms, droughts–what we’re beginning to experience now.  Fossil fuel companies, the Koch brothers, and many others have been lying to us to make more profit.

When I look to the future, I know there’s only one way forward. And that’s by continuing to build our movement from the ground up: joining with other people and getting organized.

That’s why I’m a member of 350NH. And that’s why I’m asking you today to make a donation to 350NH on #GivingTuesday.

I’m part of the leadership team at 350NH and we’ve got big plans for 2016.  I know another world is possible and look forward to building it with you.

We are working to raise $10,000 to build our movement into the upcoming year. And as a small, local organization every dollar makes a difference to our movement. Click here to contribute your tax deductible donation.

Thank you and I look forward to seeing you in the streets!

Peace,

Giselle Hart

New Hampshire is currently a participating member of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), the first mandatory greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions cap-and-trade system in North America. This program is good for New Hampshire and good for the planet – but it is under threat!! NH House Bill 0208, just introduced, would repeal NH’s participation in RGGI. There is an open hearing on Thursday, January 22 at 10:00 a.m. in Representatives Hall, State House, Concord, where concerned citizens can testify in support of RGGI (and against HB 0208), or register their opinions in writing. Please attend if at all possible!!

It is VITAL that we all contact the Science Technology and Energy Committee, where this bill has been introduced. Our representatives do pay attention to our views. To send an email to all committee members, use HouseScienceTechnologyandEnergy@leg.state.nh.us.

The RGGI program has been in place since 2009 and regulates fossil fuel-powered electric generating plants in nine Northeast and mid-Atlantic states.1 Research during the past five years indicates that the program has lead to reductions in CO2 and other dangerous air pollution (e.g. mercury, sulfur). This is an important step toward reducing CO2 emissions that

are causing the planet to warm. The reduction in emissions has also been beneficial to the health of citizens, particularly those with conditions such as asthma.

The fees paid by the carbon-emitting power plants provide income to the participating states. The funds go toward energy efficiency programs and other projects that benefit NH residents. 

Two members of 350 New Hampshire, Gwen and Doug Whitbeck, joined members of the Hollis-based New Hampshire Pipeline Awareness Organization (nhpipelineawareness.org) and scores of others from Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New York who met in Albany, NY, on October 18. Representing nearly three dozen groups fighting pipeline construction and expansion in the Northeast, the activists held a daylong coalition-building strategy session.

In almost every state in the union, people are learning there’s a new fossil fuel pipeline or pipeline expansion planned near them — or already permitted. In the Northeast at least 20 pipelines — so far — traversing thousands of miles, are underway or in the permitting stages. Opposition is building against projects that destroy conservation land and our natural water systems, thus placing the cost and risk on the citizenry while benefiting private monopolies.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) oversees pipeline permitting. Most new pipelines are intended to transport tar sands oil or fracked gas destined for export to foreign markets, where they fetch much higher prices than in the USA. Pipelines, depending on size, geography, and other factors, require a compressor station every 7-100 miles. Regular releases from these compressor stations contain toxic fumes that have devastating effects on human and animal health, and contribute to climate disruption. In addition, many of the companies involved have a less-than-stellar safety record. For example, the National Response Center, the sole federal point of contact for reporting oil and chemical spills in the U.S. and its territorial waters, found Kinder Morgan, the company which wants to build a recently announced pipeline across southern New Hampshire, was responsible for 1,800 violations since it was incorporated in 1997.

Adding to the long list of issues in play, most Northeastern states manage public pension funds that are heavily invested in fossil fuels, thus directly funding these industrial assaults. A populist movement against such corruption of public funds is growing rapidly: Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, and New York have fossil-fuel divestment campaigns and have introduced legislation.

“People across the region are coming to realize that even if their state has little or no potential for actual drilling, they are still at risk from the effects of fracking,” said Clare Donohue of Sane Energy Project, a New York City-based group that organized the gathering.

“Communities throughout New York and New England are already impacted by the expansion of pipelines, compressor stations, storage facilities and waste dumping. We arranged this meeting to bring people together to share resources and strategies.”

NoFrackedGasInMass.org founder Rosemary Wessel was among the attendees from Massachusetts, which has rapidly mobilized against several pipeline threats; 34 communities along planned routes have passed opposition resolutions. Wessel pointed out that although each group at the meeting has to deal with different state and local laws, there is much they share in common, especially FERC.

“FERC would more accurately be called the Federal Energy Rubberstamp Corporation,” said Maura Stephens of FrackbustersNY. “Its primary mission is to give industry the green light to begin projects, no matter how vehement the local resistance. Allied, we will defy such intrusions to save our communities from mass industrialization.”

Attendees from Minisink, in Orange County, NY, shared stories of their painful personal experience in communities under siege. Minisink residents mounted strong opposition to a compressor station run by Millennium Pipeline, Inc. They filed thousands of pages of comments, provided hundreds of supporting documents, traveled 20 times to Washington, DC, for FERC meetings, filed a lawsuit, and even offered an alternative location for the project farther away from their homes.

Yet FERC allowed the 12,600-horsepower compressor station to go forward despite there being 200 homes within a half-mile radius. Since it opened in June 2013, many residents have been suffering physical and stress-related illnesses and watching their property values plummet. Now they’re facing another assault with a gas-fired power plant planned just a few miles away.

“It’s an odd feeling no longer being safe in your own home because the government that is allegedly protecting us allows this infrastructure to be built,” said Douglas Burd of Minisink.

Doug Whitbeck put it this way: “The time for investing in obsolete fossil fuel infrastructure is over. Instead, we would be wiser to invest in a combination of proven clean energy alternatives and modernizing our electric grid. Here, in our small New Hampshire towns, we realize we’d be powerless to stop such corporate-state collusion unless we band together with others from across the region. Together we stand a chance of stopping these short-sighted invasions of our health, homes, and future.”

Carbon has been in the news a lot lately, as climate change becomes more prevalent in policy discussion and news outlets. Carbon dioxide produced by humans is the primary driver of climate change. Scientists have determined that 350 parts per million is the maximum safe level of carbon in the atmosphere, if we wish to avoid a run-away climate catastrophe. Today that ratio stands at over 400 parts per million. The importance of regulating carbon emissions cannot be stressed enough.

The EPA’s Clean Power Plan is a major move toward regulating carbon emissions from power plants. This is a vital step as other attempts to regulate carbon from stationary sources through litigation have ended with the Supreme Court affirming the responsibility of the EPA to regulate carbon under the Clean Air Act. The rule-making in progress is critical for the EPA to begin to address carbon emissions from power plants in the near term, and any future regulation of other permanent sources.

This process has been working for some time and the new rules are moving toward the end of their extended public comment period December 1. There is still time to make your voice heard! The more the EPA hears from the public in support of carbon regulations the better. The plan can be found here.

Instructions for posting comments and the necessary links are here.

For general, if not expert, questions about this, feel free to contact Chris Whiteman at chris.a.whiteman@gmail.com.

What a glorious day it was! Blocks and blocks of passionate climate activists, social justice activists, seasoned marchers, first-time marchers – all lining up together to demonstrate our demand that world leaders address climate change with forceful, immediate actions.(Thanks to Megan Seidell for these photos of some of the great art in the March!)Folks boarded charter buses in Concord, Nashua, and Portsmouth, NH, at about 5:30 a.m., ready for the 5-hour trip to New York City. As we arrived in the city, the 30 or more blocks designated for people to line up for the March were already filled with a lively and diverse mass of people from all over the country and beyond. Canada was well-represented. The March started at 11:30, but the farthest from the starting point didn’t start moving for more than 2 hours after that – all due to the incredible size of the group!

At 12:58, we all watched for a signal to indicate the start of a 2-minute period of silence, in memory of those who have suffered from the ravages of climate change and the fossil fuel industries. As those in front of us raised their hands, we raised ours and fell silent. Then, at 1:00 p.m. a tremendous wave of sound – yells, horns, bells, whistles, claps – swept from the beginning of the march to the end. We were sounding the alarm about Climate Change!

This gigantic action took months of planning by many people in many organizations.

heck out the videos of the People’s Climate March, and look at the list of groups that were involved, at Peoplesclimate.org. 350 New Hampshire is very grateful to 350.org for the substantial financial assistance that allowed us to lower the cost of bus tickets for the riders. We are also thankful to

Sierra Club Maine, for generously subsidizing buses and agreeing to pick up riders in Portsmouth.

Galvanized by the possibility that a new fracked natural gas pipeline will traverse Southern New Hampshire as well as Massachusetts, 350NH participated in the Stop the Pipeline rally held at the Massachusetts State House on July 30.

RallyCollage by Aaron and Marcia Arsenault here

350NH believes that there are better alternatives to meeting New England’s and our State’s energy needs than adding additional pipelines carrying natural gas. Conservation in energy use, more efficiency in existing natural gas operations, and the development of renewable energy resources are all better alternatives.

Further, while natural gas releases fewer greenhouse gases than does coal when it is burned, natural gas is at least as damaging to the environment when the methane released in its production and through undetected leaks is taken into account. (Methane is the main component of natural gas. A recently released report by the International Panel on Climate Change shows that methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than previously thought, with 34 times the heat-trapping intensity of CO2.)

Quoting the Conservation Law Foundation, “there is a role for gas, but it must be limited…We cannot simply replace every retiring coal and oil plant with natural gas and expect to leave our children with a livable climate… the increased use of existing natural gas electric generation capacity has helped to pave the way for the retirement of dirtier coal plants, but building new, long-lived natural gas infrastructure without any constraints isn’t compatible with meeting our climate goals”. (4 Things You Should Know About CLF’s work on Natural Gas, Jul 29, 2014, by Shanna Cleveland)

Many pipeline opponents believe the planned pipeline is designed less to meet New England’s energy needs than to export gas to Canada, where it can be sold on world markets at a greater profit than that commanded in this country.

The immediate concern for NH is that the pipeline connection proposed by Kinder-Morgan’s Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. would, after traversing Massachusetts, run from Pepperell, Massachusetts through Hollis or its vicinity to a location in Merrimack or Amherst, from which Liberty Utilities hopes to serve new customers.

New England Governors have been proposing to finance the building of the pipeline (as well as hydropower transmission projects) by a tariff imposed on consumers of electricity. This kind of financing, forcing consumers to bear infrastructure costs, would be a first. On August 1, however, the Governors’ representatives voted to delay votes on the gas and hydropower transmission proposals, including the tariff; their vote suggests that at least the financing plan is being reconsidered.

The Stop the Pipeline rally engaged more than 400 people, individuals whose property would be destroyed or depreciated by the pipeline, members of environmental advocacy groups and legislators, all protesting the proposed tariff in addition to construction of the pipeline. Protesters delivered petitions to Governor Patrick, the speaker of the Massachusetts House and the President of the Massachusetts Senate. They lobbied their legislators and, through a delegation, met for almost an hour with Governor Patrick and his Secretary of Energy & Environmental Affairs.

More than 80 dedicated climate activists met for the “No Tar Sands!” People’s Conference and Rally on Sunday, July 13, 2014. The event, sponsored by the Tar Sands Free Northeast coalition, drew folks from New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, and Vermont. The demonstrators met to voice their demands that the governors of New England states draw the line against fossil fuels and lead the way to sustainable energy sources that do not create greenhouse gases that increase climate change.(photo:Gwen Whitbeck)

The protesters assembled in a parking area directly across from the Mt. Washington Hotel, where governors from New England states and Premiers from eastern Canadian provinces were about to meet to discuss energy and trade issues. The Canadian government is eager to transport increasing amounts of bitumen (“tar sands oil”) through New England states by rail and by pipeline. Canada would also like to send hydro-electric power from Quebec to the USA, which would require the construction of gigantic high-tension wires that would cross NH from North to South, a project called “Northern Pass.” A large group protesting the Northern Pass project held a protest rally on the same date learn more here .

Speakers from Maine’s Sierra Club, 350 Maine, National Wildlife Federation (NWF), 350 New Hampshire, and others spoke about the environmental devastation caused to Alberta, Canada, where the tar sands are being extracted. The destruction of the health and livelihood of the First Nations peoples who live in the extraction area, and the total disregard for their historic and human rights, was emphasized by speaker Sara Lachance. Jim Murphy (NWF) pointed out that fuel derived from tar sands contains much more carbon than most forms of fossil fuel, and should be banned from inclusion in our states’ heating and transportation fuels. (Photo:Read Brugger)

There was a somber moment of silence to honor the memories of the 48 residents of Lac Megantic who died as a result of the oil train explosion on July 6, 2013. The harm and death caused by the exploitation of the earth for fossil fuels occurs on global, local, and personal levels – and so we resist and act!

For more about the rally, visit 350 New Hampshire’s Facebook page and check out press coverage by NHPR here .

350 NH members and friends recognized the anniversary of the oil train explosion in Lac Megantic, Canada on July 6, 2014, by holding an “Oil Train Hazards!” Protest Rally in downtown Dover, NH. On July 6, 2013, an oil train that was parked near the town of Lac Megantic rolled into town, derailed, and exploded. The explosion and fire killed 47 people and destroyed some 30 homes, a library and a busy bar. The train had been carrying volatile Bakken crude oil from North Dakota, which is also the kind of crude being shipped through Dover.

As we gathered in Dover, at a site just blocks away from the tracks where oil trains regularly travel, our goals were to raise awareness of the hazards of transporting oil by rail, and to keep the memory of the Lac Megantic disaster alive.

Several of us wore hazmat suits and wielded mops and buckets to clean up a simulated oil spill, while others displayed posters to the constant stream of traffic. Two local news sources covered the event: Foster’s Daily Democrat here and Seacoast Herald here.

The rally concluded with a solemn remembrance of those who died in Lac Megantic a year ago. As we stood circled in a nearby park, each name and age was read aloud and a gong sounded. We left feeling renewed determination and dedication to work toward shifting our nation from fossil fuel dependence to sustainable sources of energy that do not cause climate change.