Climate Emergency Protest, Oct 2

Climate emergency - renewables now!

Protest outside offices of Xstrata Coal!

1 Macquarie Place Sydney CBD (off Loftus St, near Circular Quay) , 5pm Thursday October 2^nd

It's a climate emergency! Melting of the Arctic sea ice may be complete by the northern summer of 2010. We must urgently decarbonise our economy to radically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and existing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Xtrata, NSW's biggest coal exporter, is about to start work on the Mangoola mine in the Hunter Valley. The call for renewables is more urgent than ever!

The protest is organised by People for a Safe Climate (PSC), which brings together people from climate action groups and other environmental, peace, social justice and political organisations. We meet Thursdays, 6pm in the UTS Students Association back room, level 3, UTS Broadway. All welcome. For further info, contact Kamala, 0417 319662; Holly 0417 682 541; Alison 9818 6718

How you can help out before October 2^nd:

• Come along to the smaller stunts we're holding in the lead-up. The first such action is on Thursday Sept 25th 8-9am at Martin Place, with another on Tuesday Sept 30th.

• Help us to make props and banners for these events at a Greenpeace warehouse in Botany on Sunday September 14th. Time to be advised.

• Help out at stalls or with leafleting. Please contact us or come along to our next meeting (Thursday, 11th September). Posters and leaflets for the rally can be picked up at the Resistance Centre (23 Abercrombie St, Chippendale) or outside the UTS Students' Association (level 3, UTS Tower). Or they can be downloaded at:

http://safeclimate. wikispaces. com/poster and

http://safeclimate. wikispaces. com/leaflet+ to+print.

The rally is calling for:

100% electricity from renewables within 10 years
Former US vice-president Al Gore has called for US power generation to be 100% carbon-free within 10 years. With abundant solar, wind and geothermal resources, there's no reason why Australia couldn't be powered entirely by renewables. We must go beyond the government's inadequate targets.

Keeping power in public hands
We need maximum public accountability for the power industry. Full electricity privatisation has been knocked on the head, but there is still a danger that our new Premier will sell-off the electricity retailers, move that would continue to sacrifice our environmental needs.

The phasing out of coal
Burning coal for electricity accounts for over a third of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions each year. In addition, when Australia's coal exports are burnt, it causes more pollution than the total of Australia's domestic economy.

The expansion of public transport
Transport is responsible for 14% of Australia's carbon emissions, with the largest contribution coming from passenger cars. We need to reverse the priorities of Governments which fund for freeways while starving public transport systems.

No carbon trading loopholes!
The government is taking a business-as- usual approach to the climate emergency. Carbon trading alone will be too slow; with free permits for the big polluters it won't work at all. It must not be linked to international "carbon offset" schemes; these do nothing to reduce domestic emissions and often support environmentally damaging projects. Under its plan, the government admits, emissions will rise for some years to come.