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Global warming was also on our minds when we opened a campaign office in Edmonton. Alberta’s tar sands are one of Canada’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases, and an environmental disaster that is destroying the province’s landscape and polluting its water. Greenpeace put the government on notice when its activists hung a huge banner reading “Stop the Tar Sands” across from the provincial legislature.
The Ontario government of Dalton McGuinty also took heat from Greenpeace for its energy policy, specifically its $40 billion plan to invest in nuclear power. During provincial elections last year, Greenpeace brought home the fact that there is still no safe way to store radioactive waste by dumping mock waste barrels at McGuinty’s campaign office.
Greenpeace also called attention to the Ontario government’s failure to close down coal plants as promised. In classic style, the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise intercepted a freighter on Lake Erie delivering coal to the Nanticoke power plant, Canada’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.
The Arctic Sunrise also took direct action to save the Boreal Forest, preventing a freighter carrying pulp from the Boreal Forest from leaving port on the Saguenay River in Quebec. In another effort to save the Boreal, Greenpeace occupied the offices of Kimberly-Clark, which uses virgin pulp to make its disposable tissues and toilet paper. And activists also climbed the headquarters of Abitibi-Consolidated in downtown Montreal to hang a massive banner denouncing the logging company’s destruction of the Boreal Forest.
Meanwhile on the West Coast, Greenpeace highlighted the B.C. government’s failure to enact mandatory labelling of genetically engineered food despite strong popular opinion in the province. To press the government, we made a huge crop circle in a field of corn near Abbotsford, which the government couldn’t ignore.
In all, 2007 was a busy year for Greenpeace Canada. Thank you for supporting our work!
