Climate and energy action camp 2011:

No CO2-waste dumps! Fight for climate justice and energy sovereignty!

There no longer seems to be a way to stop climate chaos: extreme weather events, the desertification of entire regions, rising sea levels and growing threats to the livelihoods of ever more people are clear signs of advancing climate change. To be sure, the political debate around energy has shifted since the events in Fukushima. But instead of consistently supporting renewable energies and leaving fossil fuels in the ground, coal is once more legitimised through CCS (Carbon Capture and Storage) as a safe alternative to nuclear power.

We say stop! We want to link our struggles with conflicts about climate justice, and by organising a climate camp think about, live, and fight for alternatives to the madness of ‘business of usual’. We will play a part in local energy struggles by demanding energy sovereignty and the self-managed production of energy.

Autumn 2010: thousands of people protest the continued use of nuclear power by undermining and blocking the train tracks used by a train transporting nuclear waste through the country (the CASTOR – cask for storage of radioactive materials). Everywhere local groups are fighting against new coal-fired power plants, open-cast coal mining and CO2-dumps. All of these protests are fighting against a politics that promotes large-scale techno-fixes in order to serve the interests of a few major corporations. Such a politics does not provide any adequate answers to the challenges we are currently facing. The socio-ecological crisis requires that we change the structure of our economy and society, a change after which there will simply no longer be a place for large baseload power plants – irrespective of whether they run on uranium or coal. It is, after all, these kinds of structures that stand in the way of a decentralised, participatory and flexible energy system.

Summer 2011: following on from the 2008 Climate Camp in Hamburg, the protests against the ‘climate summit’ in Copenhagen, and the “Castor? Schottern!” mass civil disobedience campaign in the autumn of 2010, we are inviting everyone to join us at the Climate and Energy Action Camp in the Lausitz/Brandenburg (not too far away from Berlin)

What’s a climate camp?
A climate camp is a space for coordinating, exchanging knowledge and discussing, as well as for direct and disobedient action. The camp is also supposed to be a field for experimenting with other forms of life: a lifestyle of sufficiency is as much part of this camp as radically democratic forms of decision making.

On the 13th of April 2011, the German government passed a law regarding the demonstration and use of technologies for the capture, transport and permanent storage of CO2. Note that the energy companies will be liable for the extremely risky underground CO2 dumps only for their first 30 years of operation. Afterwards, it will be the public that will have to bear the risk of possible damages from these dumps for many centuries!
In the struggle against CCS, the German state of Brandenburg will be the one that will tip the scales one way or another, as it is the only state where the government is in support of the development of CCS-technology. The first CCS-demo-project, supposedly leading to a ‘low-carbon power plant’, and thus the construction of a new thermal power unit, is scheduled to go online in 2016 at Vattenfall’s coal-fired power plant in Jänschwalde. Construction already began in January 2011. The plant is Europe’s third largest climate killer.

CCS technology is meant to capture CO2 from coal-fired power plants, liquefy and subsequently store it underground. The risks and consequences of this subterranean dumping of CO2 are incalculable. It is unclear whether the liquid CO2 will remain in the ground, whether it rises back up to the surface, or whether it will pollute water supplies. Capturing CO2 at power plants leads to massive losses in efficiency – about a third more coal is necessary to produce the same amount of energy. This technology is therefore viable only for large power plants and further entrenches our centralised energy system. This is why we see the struggle against CCS and coal-power as part of a wider set of energy struggles wherein we also stand in solidarity with the anti-nuclear movement.

The energy companies are using the lie of ‘clean coal’ supposedly made possible by CCS in order to not have to give up either their power, or the use of climate killer coal. For the open-cast coal mines in the Lausitz alone, some 30,000 people in 136 villages have been evicted from their homes to make way for the caterpillars. The planned extension of the open-cast mine Jänschwalde-Nord would mean the destruction of three more villages – Kerkwitz, Grabko and Atterwasch.

Together with the local initiatives against CO2-dumps and open-cast coal mining we call for a just transition away from coal. We take seriously the fear of people living in mining regions that this might lead to job losses. But the only way we can create new perspective and possibilities in time to avoid dangerous climate catastrophe is if we start changing the structures now. Brandenburg can become a model region for energy sovereignty and renewable energies. It is here that the real developmental potential of the region lies, not in clinging to dirty coal.

The energy companies’ propaganda tries to convince us that sustainability is possible without a fundamental transformation of society towards social and ecological justice. But the current economic system, oriented solely towards the maximisation of profits, stands in a fundamental contradiction to the needs of people and the environment.

We fight for climate justice against the madness of infinite growth. In order to achieve this it is necessary to fundamentally question our patterns of production and consumption. The results of climate change, itself a result of 200 years of industrialisation in the global North, largely affect regions that never profited from the wealth thus produced. Solidarity with those who are suffering also means that we fight for freedom of movement. We have to take up responsibility, and therefore we demand: climate justice now!

In our climate and energy action camp we will together develop utopias, goals and strategies for a just way of dealing with energy – based on the principles of self-management, a critique of domination, and the need fort sustainable living. We will bring to the fore hitherto marginalised perspectives through our creativity and direct and disobedient actions. The camp will be international and is also being co-organised by a Polish-German anti-nuclear alliance. Come along. Join the struggle. Against CO2-dumps. For climate justice and energy sovereignty.

The climate and energy action camp will take place from the 7th to the 14th of August in Jänschwalde/Brandenburg (close to Cottbus).