Welcome back to Movement Mondays in which I discuss all things climate and frequently highlight a frontline community enduring the worst effects of the climate crisis, along with a request to take action on their behalf. Today we’re focusing on the communities along the Gulf of Mexico, people and places that are treated as sacrifice zones due to extractive energy practices. They do not want more oil and gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico. Rather, they want a just transition to renewable energy sources that will provide safe, good-paying jobs while also protecting the water, air, and land where they live.

Fire that resulted from the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig.
US Coast Guard / Public Domain / Wikimedia Commons

Today’s quick action is to personalize a letter to the White House Council on Environmental Quality, demanding that Biden keep his campaign promise for no new oil and gas leases on federal land. The White House is about to release the “five-year plan” for oil and gas leasing in the Gulf of Mexico. The following is fromHealthyGulf.org

The “five year plan” is the guiding document for how the Federal government leases offshore areas to private companies to explore and drill for oil and gas. With climate change accelerating and the clean energy revolution upon us, we can’t afford to expand drilling in the Gulf. The people of the Gulf Coast want President Biden to honor his campaign pledge of no expansion of oil and gas drilling. Tell President Biden we need a five year plan with no new leases!

Access the letter here and personalize with your own outlook and experiences following the hottest summer in recorded history. When the scientific community tells us over and over and over again that in order to have a livable planet we must keep all fossil fuels in the ground, we must act. When people and communities tell us over and over and over again that they are negatively impacted by extractive energy practices, we must act.

(NOTE: To learn more about the Deepwater Horizon tragedy in 2010 which surpassed the Exxon Valdez tragedy of 1989, go here.)

SOME UPDATES:

Yesterday, an estimated 75,000 people took to the streets in New York City* to demand an end to fossil fuels. Here’s a segment from DemocracyNow that includes a speech from Sharon Lavigne of Rise St. James. (Rise St. James is a faith-based grassroots organization fighting for environmental justice as it works to defeat the proliferation of petrochemical industries in St. James Parish, Louisiana.) Sharon and her community would be very happy to know we’re sending letters that demand no new oil and gas leases in the Gulf!
*There were corresponding climate actions to #EndFossilFuels on all 7 continents!

Today, Sunrise Movement and 50+ organizations signed onto a letter to Biden asking him to use his Executive Order to establish a Civilian Climate Corps akin to the CCC during the New Deal. This modern CCC would offer good-paying, safe jobs to young people who’d be working to combat the climate crisis. The idea is a win/win. And speaking as someone who, pre-pandemic, spent a lot of time as a young-at-heart member of Sunrise, a CCC would go a long ways toward easing their acute anxiety about their futures on this planet. PLEASE feel free to contact your Senators and Representative to ask that they push Biden to establish a modern CCC. 🙂

Thank you for reading this far. Please let me know if you were able to attend a climate action near you this past week. (There was nothing in Denver (!) but there were other rallies in other cities throughout Colorado.) We’re heading out for a couple nights of camping tomorrow and I look forward to a dose of Nature. Wishing you and yours a good week. Solidarity!  ✊🏽