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Kamala Harris needs to lead the country in addressing this biggest of all problems: our climate crisis and the dominance of the fossil fuel industry in our politics and policies.
President Joe Biden lost a lot of support, especially among young voters and climate voters, when he approved the foolish Willow Project. The Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) was equally unpopular with those groups but they rightfully placed most of the blame for that project on Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V).
What a lot of people, including reporters, don’t realize is that Pete Buttigieg, as Secretary of Transportation, had (and still has) the power to stop MVP. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) reports to Buttigieg and PHMSA, as its name implies, has the authority and responsibility to ensure the pipelines are built and operated safely. But the MVP was not built—nor is it operating—safely. That is not an opinion pulled out of thin air by a climate activist. Rather it is the conclusion of a study done by TC Energy (formerly TransCanada), the company that wanted to build the Keystone XL Pipeline (KXL). That study was the subject of an article (pg 16) in the Jan/Feb 2020 issue of Corrosion Management, a journal of the Institute of Corrosion.
This topic has been written about extensively for over a year. If reporters and other readers want to understand the particulars they can find them here. The long and short of it is that the TC Energy/KXL study proved that MVP’s corrosion-proof coating is “no longer fit for purpose.” That’s a pretty damning indictment, especially given the enormous diameter (42 inches) of MVP and the extremely high pressure it will be operating under. It’s particularly scary for all those who live within MVP’s blast zone.
MVP is made of thick steel. It isn’t going to corrode extensively tomorrow or anytime right away. But pipelines like MVP are built with the intention that they will operate for many, many decades, which is why legally they MUST have an adequate corrosion-proof coating. Otherwise they will corrode prematurely which could lead to a massive explosion. Delaney Tercero was 3 when a 10 inch gas pipeline exploded near her home because defective coating allowed the pipe to corrode. She died 2 days later in a hospital burn unit. Again, MVP is 42 inches.
The National Association of Pipe Coating Applicators (NAPCA) recommends that the pipe coating that was applied to MVP pipe should not be exposed to the harmful rays of the sun for more than 6 months. MVP pipe sat out in the sun for 6-7 years. A KXL pipeline manager, speaking at an oil and gas forum in Canada, said that, when the coating has deteriorated to such a degree, the pipe either needs to be replaced or sent back to the factory for stripping, cleaning, and recoating. He said this is a problem that can’t be remedied in the field. MVP pipe was neither replaced nor properly recoated. It was just quickly buried and covered up, as if that would make the problem go away.
Pete Buttigieg is obviously a very smart guy. He’s articulate, does his homework and has a knack for making members of Congress look ridiculous when they try to question him. If anyone can explain why the KXL coating study doesn’t apply to MVP, it would be Secretary Buttigieg. But neither he nor PHMSA nor MVP nor anyone else has ever offered that explanation. Buttigieg seems to pop up everywhere these days but he hasn’t met with the people who live next to MVP and been willing to address their fears about the defective pipe coating. And the reason he hasn’t is because he can’t explain away the KXL study’s obvious relevance to MVP which leaves him unable to defend PHMSA’s decision to allow MVP to operate.
And this problem isn’t limited to MVP. Pipeline giant, Williams, has just built pipelines in Louisiana and Pennsylvania using old pipe intended for the now-dead Constitution Pipeline in NY. That pipe has been sitting out in the sun for over a decade. Williams has now buried it right next to houses, schools, playgrounds, ball parks, through golf courses and under interstate highways.
Essentially, despite all their posturing, Pete Buttigieg and PHMSA are just part of the Good Ol’ Boy network that oversees much of our country’s energy regulatory system which remains heavily controlled by the fossil fuel industry. Up and down the chain of command people go along to get along, as pointed out in this article that Bill McKibben called landmark by Mike Soraghan of Politico’s E&E News. That system has resulted in America being the largest oil and gas producer ever, which is deplorable given the scientific consensus regarding climate change. It is why we are so far behind in achieving our climate goals.
Kamala Harris needs to lead the country in addressing this biggest of all problems. She needs to separate herself from the Good Ol’ Boy network. She should start by picking someone other than Pete Buttigieg to be her VP.
More than a thousand climate youth leaders and allies converged on Washington, DC this weekend for the largest student-led civil resistance action at the White House in a generation. They came to register their dissent against extreme fossil fuel exploitation and to demand that President Obama reject the northern leg of TransCanada's Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.
The scene outside the White House on Sunday was remarkable. After marching through the streets, the students rallied at Lafayette Square, chanting: "Obama, come out! We've got some shit to talk about!" and "The people are rising! No more compromising!" A short while later, in a sudden burst of energy, a sea of bodies surged toward the White House to occupy the fence, while others fell to the ground, victims of a mock tar sands oil spill. All did it knowing they would be arrested.
Student leaders from nearly 50 universities and colleges from across the country signed the #XLDISSENT call to action, which calls "into question" President Obama's "willingness to govern in an environmentally responsible manner." Their statement goes on to say:
President Obama has indeed made several responsible choices, such as increasing the mileage standards for cars. But he has also made some disastrous ones. He opened vast swaths of Western lands for coal mining, repeatedly endorsed an "all-of-the-above" energy approach, and even supported the Southern leg of the Keystone pipeline.
I suspect many students who participated in this action share my sense of betrayal over President Obama's 2012 fast-track approval of Keystone XL's southern leg (which has 70% of the capacity to transport tar sands as Keystone XL's northern leg). By calling out the president on this gross injustice, they are reminding everyone that with Obama's ownership of Keystone South comes responsibility for any tar sands spills that occur in Texas and Oklahoma, and for toxic emissions breathed by families living in fenceline communities near tar sands refineries in Houston and Port Arthur.
Time is slipping away for President Obama to salvage his tattered environmental legacy. He can start by denouncing Keystone North, jettisoning his "all-of-the-above" energy policy, and producing a new climate action plan that has a real chance of averting climate chaos.
In solidarity, I share this video of an emergency direct action several of us organized at the White House on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 85th birthday in January. Inspired by what Dr. King called "the fierce urgency of now," it was a last-ditch effort to try to prevent Keystone South from starting up:
Civil Resistance to Ensure our Civil Existence: Going to Jail to Stop Keystone XL SouthWARNING: Watching long, drawn out arrests can be kind of like watching paint dry... While some sing, chant, pray and drum, ...
Action by action, we are building what Dr. King called "the beloved community." Future generations will honor these young climate justice leaders who sacrificed their freedom to demand an end to these immoral assaults on our collective future. Call it civil resistance to ensure our civil existence.
(All photos by the author. Used with permission)
The Keystone XL tar sands pipeline into the highest profile environmental fight in recent memory
Earlier this morning, I took a break from press calls and preparations for this weekend's big XL Dissent protest in Washington, D.C. to go back and watch some of the original videos we made during Tar Sands Action, the two-weeks of sit-ins in August 2011 that helped turn the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline into the highest profile environmental fight in recent memory.
In a video from the first day of the protests, Gus Speth, a former White House official and co-founder of the Natural Resources Defense Council, says, "We have to draw a line in the sand somewhere and this is a perfect place to draw it. It's a new, controversial, unconventional fossil resource with tremendous potential to harm the global climate, and for Obama to do something in his own power which doesn't require Congress, that would be electrifying and send a powerful signal around this country and around the world that we are going to act."
Tar Sands Action: Come Join Us!A short film capturing first day of 2-weeks of sit-ins at the White House to stop the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline. More info: ...
He continues, "Power responds to a demand and we have to let that demand be heard. It's time to step outside the system and do some things we haven't done before."
Speth was arrested that day and spent two nights in DC central cell block. He got a message out from jail that read, "The only thing we need is more company."
"From the fossil fuel divestment movement to the increasing levels of direct action and civil disobedience, young people are finding powerful ways to make an impact and stand in solidarity with the frontline communities who are feeling the impacts of our dirty energy economy and the climate crisis."
And boy, did he get it. Over the two weeks of Tar Sands Action, 1,253 people were arrested during daily sit-ins protesting the pipeline. Since then, arrests have continued across the country, from the Tar Sands Blockade in Texas, to young people in Michigan (who are still fighting charges), to more civil rights and environmental leaders back at the White House. Those that have gone to jail have been joined by tens of thousands more protesters in the streets during events like Forward on Climate, which brought over 40,000 people to the Capitol last February.
This weekend, will be the largest single act of civil disobedience yet. Over 1,000 students and young people are expected to take part in the XL Dissent protest at the White House. More than 300 of them are planning on risking arrest. If the action goes according to plan, it could turn out to be the largest youth-led act of civil disobedience at the White House in a generation.
I've had the chance to talk with some of the students involved in XL Dissent and the thing that continues to strike me is how level-headed and pragmatic they are. They're risking arrest this weekend not because they're wild-eyed radicals, but because they agree with Speth that power responds to a demand, and that getting that demand heard often requires working outside traditional channels.
Howard Zinn wrote, "Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy; it is absolutely essential to it." After years of greening campuses, pushing for recycling and carbon neutrality, and educating their classmates about the threat of climate change, students are increasingly adopting protest as a tool for social change. From the fossil fuel divestment movement to the increasing levels of direct action and civil disobedience, young people are finding powerful ways to make an impact and stand in solidarity with the frontline communities who are feeling the impacts of our dirty energy economy and the climate crisis.
President Obama should know something about the power of principled protest. As he recounts in his autobiography "Dreams From My Father," his first public speech was at a college rally pushing for divestment from apartheid South Africa. As the President looks out from the windows of the White House this Sunday at the hundreds of student activists getting taken away from his fence in handcuffs, many of them divestment organizers back on campus, perhaps it will remind him of the reasons that got him into politics in the first place.
Keystone XL is more than an environmental issue, it's a test of character. The young people taking part in XL Dissent are demonstrating theirs. Now, it's time for the President to show his.