Tar Sands Blockade is a

grassroots A grassroots movement is one that uses the people in a given district, region or community as the basis for a political or economic movement. Grassroots movements and organizations use collective action from the local level to effect change at t ...

coalition of affected

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

and Oklahoma people and

climate justice Climate justice is a concept that addresses the just division, fair sharing, and equitable distribution of the burdens of climate change and its mitigation and responsibilities to deal with climate change. "Justice", "fairness", and "equity" ar ...

organizers who use peaceful and sustained

civil disobedience Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a stat ...

to stop the

Keystone XL The Keystone Pipeline System is an oil pipeline system in Canada and the United States, commissioned in 2010 and owned by TC Energy and as of 31 March 2020 the Government of Alberta. It runs from the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin in Albert ...

tar sands pipeline. Tar Sands Blockade used nonviolent

direct action Direct action originated as a political activist term for economic and political acts in which the actors use their power (e.g. economic or physical) to directly reach certain goals of interest, in contrast to those actions that appeal to othe ...

to stop construction of the pipeline throughout East Texas including

banner drop A banner drop is the protest action of putting a banner in public place to spread a message and raise awareness. The banner may target a corporation, a law, a political campaign, or any activism. The banner may itself be dropped on an activist ...

lockdown A lockdown is a restriction policy for people, community or a country to stay where they are, usually due to specific risks (such as COVID-19) that could possibly harm the people if they move and interact freely. The term is used for a prison ...

s, and

tree sits Tree sitting is a form of environmentalist civil disobedience in which a protester sits in a tree, usually on a small platform built for the purpose, to protect it from being cut down (speculating that loggers will not endanger human lives by cutt ...

. They are best known for a large scale tree sit outside

Winnsboro, Texas Winnsboro is a city in Franklin and Wood counties in northeastern Texas, United States, north of Tyler. The population was 3,434 at the 2010 census, down from 3,584 at the 2000 census. Settlement of Winnsboro began in the 1850s with a post office ...

Naomi Klein Naomi A. Klein (born May 8, 1970) is a Canadian author, social activist, and filmmaker known for her political analyses, support of ecofeminism, organized labour, left-wing politics and criticism of corporate globalization, fascism, ecofascism ...

attributes the origin of the term ''

Blockadia Blockadia is a global anti-extractivism movement; and a roving, transnational conflict zone where everyday people obstruct development of extractive projects, especially in the fossil fuel industry. Blockadia resistance movements differ from main ...

,'' which describes a global anti-extractivist movement to the hour-long documentary ''Blockadia Rising'' (2013) that Tar Sands Blockade produced to describe the dangers of tar sands extraction and highlight their direct actions. The group occupied blockades for 86 days in 2012, forcing TransCanada to reroute the pipeline.

Political and environmental issues

TransCanada, a

multinational corporation A multinational company (MNC), also referred to as a multinational enterprise (MNE), a transnational enterprise (TNE), a transnational corporation (TNC), an international corporation or a stateless corporation with subtle but contrasting senses, i ...

, was building the Gulf Coast Project section of the

with the go ahead from the Obama administration in 2012. This section of the pipeline passed from Oklahoma through East Texas into the Gulf. Anti-pipeline

activist Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fr ...

s and environmental organizations claimed that probable pipe spillage would threaten groundwater,

ecosystems An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syst ...

, surrounding lands, employment, and the economy. The pipeline would cross 631 streams and wetlands in Texas, including not the

Sulphur River The Sulphur River is a river in northeast Texas and southwest Arkansas in the United States. Geography The Sulphur River begins at the confluence of its north and south forks forming (following earlier meanders) the northern and southern bounda ...

and the entire

Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer The Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer is an aquifer in Texas, United States. The aquifer supplies water to about 12 million homes in East Texas. The aquifer's water quality is claimed to be at risk from leaks and spills from the Keystone XL tar sands pipelin ...

, which is the water supply for 12 million homes in East Texas. A

whistleblower A whistleblower (also written as whistle-blower or whistle blower) is a person, often an employee, who reveals information about activity within a private or public organization that is deemed illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe or fraudulent. Whi ...

, Evan Vokes, came forward about TransCanada in mid-October, 2012, to confirm allegations of regulatory non-compliance.

References

{{Reflist, 2 Bituminous sands Environmental movements Environmental organizations based in the United States Nonviolent occupation Environmental organizations established in 2012 2012 establishments in the United States Protests in Texas

Political and environmental issues

See also

References