Germany: Largest Lignite Mine in Europe Shut Down for 2 Days by Sabotage

Ger­many: Largest Lig­nite Mine in Europe Shut Down by Sab­o­tage for 2 days.

In the ear­ly hours of Mon­day Morn­ing April 25, in the dark of the night, pow­er cor­ri­dor with 10 pow­er mains sup­ply­ing cur­rent to the mas­sive dig­gers, con­vey­or belts and all oth­er facil­i­ties  of the Largest Lig­nite Open­cast Mine in Europe have been set ablaze result­ing in the whole mine being shut down for 2 days and con­tin­u­ing to oper­ate to this moment in lim­it­ed capac­i­ty.  This act of eco­tage fol­lows by a week dam­ag­ing of a pow­er pylon to neigh­bour­ing Indi­en mine.  Both mines exploit lig­nite which with its high mois­ture and con­t­a­m­i­nant con­tent and low ener­gy coe­fi­cient is only used to sup­ply pow­er gen­er­at­ing plants, a series of which sur­rounds the mines with one pow­er plant exclu­sive­ly pow­er­ing the  the Ham­bach mine.

This act of eco­tage and destruc­tion of equip­ment with­out the injury or loss of life has tak­en aim at the indus­try which accord­ing to still rather con­ser­v­a­tive 2015 study of World Health Organ­i­sa­tion on the Effects of Air­borne Fos­sil Fuel pol­lu­tants is respon­si­ble for sev­en mil­lion deaths around the world each year, mak­ing it the sin­gle great­est envi­ron­men­tal health risk, con­tribut­ing to one out of every eight glob­al deaths.  Even more dras­tic  and irre­versible effects on cli­mate change(not includ­ed in the above men­tioned study), to which coal is the lead­ing con­tribut­ing fac­tor, esti­mat­ed to reach a run-away effect at 2 degrees centi­grade glob­al change by IPCC com­mit­tee with a new con­sen­sus form­ing plac­ing that point at 1.5 degree annu­al tem­per­a­ture change on which brink we are present­ly.  Hav­ing already caused glob­al bleach­ing and die-off to the rain­forests of the oceans — the coral reefs,  the com­bined tem­per­a­ture change and the increased acid­i­ty from car­bon absorb­tion to worlds ocean is about to make this largest habi­tat on earth unliv­able to the next most sen­si­tive organ­isms: plank­ton.  Plank­ton which con­sti­tutes the very foun­da­tion of the whole ocean eco-sys­tem caus­ing in effect unprece­dent­ed glob­al die-off and dec­i­ma­tion of life, putting one of the largest human-caused plan­e­tary extinc­tions aready tak­ing place into high­er gear still.
As this March became the hottest month on record and as Green­land ice cov­er under­went unprece­dent­ed melt­ing a month ahead of its usu­al time, and as emp­ty non-bind­ing promis­es are made at more and more policed, mil­i­tarised world cli­mate sum­mits all of this as the world slides into the future of chaos and insta­bil­i­ty it is in this case at least that the future gen­er­a­tions will be able to know that not all stood silent and com­pla­cent when faced with a glob­al hege­mo­ny of extreme ener­gy extrac­tion and its not so silent part­ners of dis­in­for­ma­tion, apa­thy and repres­sion.  We are how­ev­er still at a very high risk of these same  future human descen­dants and ecosys­tems fac­ing a dire real­i­ty in which so lit­tle has been done.

That is why Ham­bach For­est Earth-First salutes those respon­si­ble for remind­ing all that it is not a crime to com­mit a less­er “crime” in order to pre­vent a much larg­er one of glob­al destruc­tion, death and eco­cide from tak­ing place as it has for so long in full impuni­ty and in broad day­light……

Ham­bach­er For­est Earth­First!

http://hambachforest.blogsport.de

 

[Ed: More info here & here]