Stop Kingsnorth: no to new coal power

This blog has now moved to www.stopkingsnorth.org

28 July 2008

NO NEW COAL march from Rochester to Kingsnorth power station


Date: Sun 3rd August
Assemble: Rochester Station Car Park 12pm,
Rally starts at 12.30pm,
Set off at 1pm

Listen to speakers from local groups, as well as national NGOs that are working on the issue of coal, talk about why a new coal fired power station at kingsnorth should never happen....

Dress as a dinosaur, a power station chimney or anything you can think of to draw attention to the growing movement that is forming against a new wave of coal fired power stations

Link up with Climate Camp Caravans from London and Brighton on their last day, and cyclists from London and around the country who will join us en route, and once we get to Kingsnorth, walk together with us to the climate camp.

Logistics:
Trains to Rochester take 40-70 minutes from Victoria/ London Bridge stations.

If you don't want to walk the whole way, you can get a bus which runs from Strood to Hoo every hour and just join us for the first and last parts.

More info
www.campaigncc.org/kingsnorth.shtml

24 June 2008

Kent, coal and climate change: a local issue going global


The World Development Movement will be holding a film and discussion night on ‘Kent, coal and climate change – A local issue going global’ on 17 July, from 7.30pm at Fort Amherst, Dock Road, Chatham, ME4 4UB

Speakers include Sean Furey from the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England Kent and premieres of films from Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Robert Redford and the World Development Movement.

Find out more - book online - facebook event information

Kent facing climate change threat

According to a new map released by the World Development Movement today, Kent will face the brunt of potential sea level rises caused by climate change. The map redraws the Kent coastline, leaving many communities flooded.

4 June 2008

Golby, listen up! Campaigners say YES all the time

For Paul Golby, EON CEO, to claim that climate campaigners are saying ‘no’ to all energy proposals (Guardian 4th June), shows he is not listening very hard. For years now, campaigners have been saying ‘yes’ to investment in renewables, ‘yes’ to increased energy efficiency, and ‘yes’ to a secure energy future. In fact, we are only saying ‘no’ when it comes to continuing on an out-dated high carbon energy pathway in the face of catastrophic climate change which is already responsible for thousands of deaths each year.

We are saying ‘yes’ to a renewable energy revolution because it would curb price rises, give Britain energy independence from imported fossil fuels and, as other utilities have wisely pointed out, it would protect us from a future of volatile coal, oil and gas prices. To continue on our high carbon path, depending on an archaic form of energy generation which uses scarce fossil fuels, will mean that blackouts like those just last week (the worst since 1987) will become a regular occurrence.

So yes Mr Golby, we are fully behind the government’s announcement of a scheme to deliver 25 GW of electricity through wind. And yes, we agree with EON that it won’t cover our future energy needs. Which is why we are pushing the government to say yes to this being only the beginning of a massive investment in renewables, and to say no to Kingsnorth coal power station, which will undermine any chance of the renewable revolution taking off.

3 June 2008

"Leave it in the ground!" demand open cast protestors in Derbyshire

Last Bank Holiday Monday (26th May), around 70 people went for a picnic in a remote part of Derbyshire, which is set to be the site of a new open-cast coal mine. The event was organised by a new campaign group called Leave it in the Ground and Earth First! You can click the picture to read the full report.

2 May 2008

May Day, May Day, stop the climate emergency

Warwick Students march on EON HQ

People & Planet are building a coal power station complete with 12ft cooling towers at
EON HQ, Westwood Business Park, Coventry to protest against their plans to build a new
coal-fired power stations at Kingsnorth in Kent.
Kingsnorth in Kent, will ensure the UK's international leadership on climate change goes up
in smoke as a company interested only in its profits and intent on opening up the doors to
run away climate change.

People & Planet is calling for a full Public Inquiry into the Kingsnorth proposal in order that
the negative impacts of such a move are fully exposed. We are also calling for a
moratorium on any new coal-fired power stations until the technology to capture and store
the carbon they release is fully operational and fitted.

The EON claims that it will be possible to fit carbon capture technology to Kingsnorth at a
later date. There is currently not a single coal power station anywhere in the world that
uses this technology. By IPCC estimates, carbon capture and storage (CCS) will only be
realistically deployed around the world in the second half of the century. This leaves at
least forty years of standard dirty coal emissions.

The action is to highlight short-sighted idiocy in continuing to extract and burn fossil fuels.

For more info see http://peopleandplanet.org/stopclimatechaos/

24 April 2008

Rob Newman on Kingsnorth