Activist Disrupts Sale of Utah Oil and Gas Drilling Leases

On December 19th, the Bush Administration held an auction in Salt Lake City for oil and gas drilling leases on land adjacent to national parks. A lot of people have been upset about this ‘fire sale’ ever since it was announced, and one activist decided to do something about it.

Tim DeChristopher, fully expecting to be arrested and charged, drove up the price of land parcels by bidding them up with no intention of paying for them. The environmental activist was escorted from the Bureau of Land Management offices after throwing the process into chaos before the sale of 132 parcels covering 164,000 acres was concluded.

From MSNBC:

“He’s tainted the entire auction,” said Kent Hoffman, deputy state director for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in Utah.

Buyers will have 10 days to reconsider and withdraw their bids, Hoffman said.

The FBI was questioning a man who registered for the auction as Tim DeChristopher of Salt Lake City, said the bureau’s Utah Energy Team Leader Terry Catlin.

Other bidders at the auction complained about DeChristopher as unfamiliar and bidding in an unconventional fashion, which raised suspicions, Catlin said.

DeChristopher is believed to have won the bidding on 13 parcels and driven up the price of several others. He said he successfully bid on more than $1.7 million in parcels.

It’s pretty hilarious to imagine all of these uptight oil and gas company representatives and government officials getting all worked up over an “unfamiliar” man bidding in an “unconventional fashion”. Good for him for disrupting the process.  This ‘midnight sale’ was unfair in the first place, so it serves them right to have to deal with some confusion and delay.

Link [MSNBC]

Al Gore Urges Civil Disobedience to Fight Coal Plants

Al Gore has a message for you, environmentalists: it’s okay to engage in a little civil disobedience here and there when the goal is as important as stopping the construction of coal plants that don’t have the ability to store carbon.  After all, civil disobedience is one of the few ways ordinary citizens still have to make sure our voices are heard.  Gore, speaking to a philanthropic meeting in New York, said on Wednesday that “the world has lost ground to the climate crisis”.

From Reuters:

“If you’re a young person looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now, and not done, I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration,” Gore told the Clinton Global Initiative gathering to loud applause.

“I believe for a carbon company to spend money convincing the stock-buying public that the risk from the global climate crisis is not that great represents a form of stock fraud because they are misrepresenting a material fact,” he said. “I hope these state attorney generals around the country will take some action on that.”

According to the government, about 28 coal plants are currently under construction in the United States right now and another 20 projects have permits or are near the start of construction.  The carbon emitted from coal plants are a key factor in global warming.

Part of the problem is the fact that we, as a nation, have been apathetic for too long.  We’ve allowed money-hungry corporations to control our lives and dictate our futures, to the extent that every living creature on earth is now in danger. The truth is that we do hold a lot of power in our hands.  We outnumber the executives and the government officials.  If we all stand together and demand something, it will be done.  We just haven’t taken that power into our hands on a mass scale.  So we say, hell yeah, Al.  Civil disobedience is definitely called for in these frightening times.

Link [Reuters]
Photo credit: Sydney Indymedia