Cruising to Catastophe
13.06.2021
At 9.30pm on 12 June members of Ocean Rebellion took to the seas again, this time to shine a light on the cruise liner Silja Europa – an expensive temporary home for the police during the G7 conference.
Ocean Rebellion projected slogans onto the cruise liner, which chuffed its fossil fuelled way from The Baltic last week, including AS THE SEA DIES WE DIE / STOP GREENWASHING, TAX SHIPPING FUEL NOW / STOP OVERFISHING, FURLOUGH THE FLEET / CRUISES SPREAD DISEASES.
The Silja Europa has been brought in from Estonia to house over 1000 police despite the fact there are empty ferries sitting in the Fal estuary and Falmouth docks. Calculations show that the environmental cost of renting this cruise ship is equivalent to every police officer on the boat driving to the moon and back 6 times in a fossil fuel powered car.
Ocean Rebellion demands the government stops wasting money on pointless conferences filled with greenwash and fancy meals. The world needs governments willing to protect and repair the ocean. Ocean Rebellion demands the G7 agrees to:
Tax shipping fuels NOW
Furlough fishing fleets NOW
Protect the high seas from deep sea mining NOW
Stop chemical pollution from cosmetics, sewage, plastics and agriculture NOW
Rob Higgs says
“Shipping is responsible for 400,000 premature deaths worldwide. Bottom trawling releases even more carbon dioxide than the world’s aviation. Deep sea mining is another classic example of greenwashing damage. We are being told it’s for the green lithium economy, yet these mining licenses are being issued to arms companies. Common sense says this must change immediately to avert catastrophic climate collapse.”
Clive Russell says:
“We need to act now to combat catastrophic climate change, ocean acidification, and biodiversity loss. Unless we tackle all these issues, we will kill the Ocean. We are all connected to the fate of this wonder-filled space, and AS THE SEA DIES WE DIE.”
Sophie Miller adds:
“We ask the UK government to keep their promise and use the G7 conference to lead meaningful environmental change. Stop business as usual and begin the drastic action needed to address the crisis. We must change the future needs before it’s too late.”
Daisy Pearson says:
“Black carbon from shipping is directly contributing to the albedo effect and hastening the melt of the Greenland ice sheet, a well-known climate tipping point. This puts our survival on this planet at risk. Governments are playing a dangerous game with our lives and it is the global south, those least responsible for climate change, who are suffering. We say stop now.”
Roc Sandford of Ocean Rebellion says:
“The UK government, despite its green posturing, has just splurged mad amounts of harmful shipping fuel sailing a cruise liner from the Baltic just to house police brought in for G7. Either they don’t understand how harmful this is, or they don’t care. Or both. To avert runaway climate and nature breakdown shipping and aviation must be taxed now at a level which drives down their use by at least 10% a year, in line with the rest of the economy. Make the polluters pay before they collapse our society.”
Black Carbon / IMO photos, Guy Reece