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Sandra,
This week, 15,000 oil industry executives, lobbyists, princes and politicians swooped into Vancouver like a flock of vultures. They’re here for the world’s largest fossil fuel conference, LNG 2023.
As deadly floods lash northern India, wildfires rage across Canada and the world’s oceans hit temperatures never seen before in human history – they want to frack and burn more methane.
We couldn’t let their nihilistic agenda go unchallenged. Although security guards kept us out of the venue, dozens of Frack Free BC activists plugged up the entrance yesterday morning.
On cue, everybody dropped to the pavement in a “die-in” meant to symbolize the rising death toll from gas-fuelled climate disasters. The oil and gas arsonists literally had to step around our bodies if they wanted to get into their conference.
Once delegates got inside, their phones displayed “LNG Kills” ads paid for by Dogwood donors and geotargeted to the convention centre. Outside, we razzed them on megaphones and held up signs against the windows.
Thank you if you were a part of delivering the message!
What did they talk about inside? We know a key focus of the conference is cracking open B.C.’s Montney gas formation (the sixth-largest carbon bomb on the planet). Companies like Shell and Petronas want more pipelines and more gas terminals on the B.C. coast.
But any journalists skeptical of oil and gas industry propaganda were barred from the building. I tried to apply as a delegate and was rejected (maybe a good thing, since tickets start at $4,780 USD).
“Petroleum Papers” author and DeSmog contributor Geoff Dembicki had his conference credentials canceled after he arrived in Vancouver. He wrote about our action instead, since he couldn’t get in the building.
Why is the industry so paranoid? Because despite their ludicrous claims about ‘clean’ gas, the appetite for investment in fossil fuel projects is shifting. Demand for oil and gas will soon slow in Europe and Asia as technologies like electric heat pumps scale up.[1]
The Coastal GasLink pipeline has cost investors billions as construction bogs down in B.C.’s mountainous terrain. Despite years of surveillance, harassment and militarized raids by police, Indigenous land defenders refuse to give up.
Those two factors convinced Enbridge to hit pause on its Westcoast Connector project – leaving future LNG terminals on the North Coast without a delivery pipeline. That’s good news.
Meanwhile, BC Hydro is putting out a call next year for utility-scale solar, wind and other clean power projects across the province, with a focus on Indigenous communities. There are real economic opportunities coming, beyond oil and gas.
Our job in the meantime is to stop the fossil fuel industry from expanding so that tipping point can take hold. Thanks for your help and support,
Alexandra
P.S. Here’s banned DeSmog reporter Geoff Dembicki’s article about yesterday’s Frack Free BC die-in. For more critical coverage of the LNG 2023 conference, and our action outside, check out this piece in the National Observer and this video we made for Instagram.
[1] https://davidsuzuki.org/press/lng-neither-a-bridge-fuel-nor-a-climate-solution-according-to-new-report/
Thanks for all you do,
The No Tankers team
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