Members of Third Act Maine protest recently at the Chase branch in Yarmouth, urging the bank to stop investing in the fossil fuel industry. Contributed / Bill Rixon
Climate activists from Third Act Maine plan to join members of the national group next month in Washington, D.C., for three days of protest at the U.S. Department of Energy.
The demonstration Feb. 6-8 will be focused on urging Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm to stop approving new liquified natural gas terminals.
“Hundreds if not thousands of climate activists from across the country will be there,” said Bill Rixon of Freeport, a member of Third Act Maine who has been involved in environmental activism for many years.
“Down in the Gulf Coast and Louisiana coast, there are 20 new export facilities being planned,” Rixon said.
Chase and Citibank are among the top banks financing the new terminals and are two of the main targets of Third Act Maine’s weekly protests.
“We’re urging them to stop the permitting and to do new environmental impacts … If these are built, they’ll be carbon bombs,” Rixon said.
“The amount of CO2 released would equal the total output of the whole European Union,” he said.
“The emissions associated with them will wipe out every bit of progress the U.S. has made on reducing carbon and methane since 2005,” Bill McKibben, founder of Third Act, wrote in a press release.
“In the hottest year of human history, it’s obscene to be putting up more of them,” McKibben said.
Rixon said Third Act Maine has been hosting weekly webinars on the history and importance of nonviolent civil disobedience, in preparation for the protest in Washington, D.C.
“These LNG terminals need to be stopped. It imperils our climate futures for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren,” he said. “It would be great if the secretary of energy would assess the environmental and climate impact.
“Ultimately, we would like to see these corporations do the right thing,” he said, but added that Third Act Maine’s work is also about “educating the public and bearing witness to these corporations passing themselves off as good neighbors and responsible citizens while they are complicit in the climate crisis.”
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