Take action!
Be part of the global movement to avoid dangerous climate change in three easy steps:
1. Send the link to our blog to everyone in your adress book.
2. Mail a package of charcoal to your head of state. Here is the letter-to-your-head-of-state ready for print-out. Film yourself or take a picture.
3. Post the picture, upload the video, send us the links or the files!
That’s it. We can do it.
PS: For all Germans here is the letter to Angela Merkel with her adress already inside
Tolle Aktion!
Nur: warum Holzkohle? Die ist eigentlich nicht so sehr das Problem (nachwachsender Rohstoff).
Wie waere es mit Briketts? Eierkohlen?
Waere stimmiger.
Aber am Ende ist es das wichtigste: get going!
Viel Glueck!
Joerg Haas
25 Feb 09 at 16:58
blöde idee.
wen interessiert das, wenn das merkel ne kiste kohle bekommt?
außerdem ist eure aktion viel zu aufwendig, die mühe macht sich doch keiner. sammelt lieber ne tonne kohle und kippt sie vor den reichstag. das bekommt wenigstens jemand mit….
Ich
25 Feb 09 at 17:53
Holzkohle ist es aus zwei Gründen: 1. Die ist überall zu kaufen. 2. Es geht um symbolischen Protest, bei dem wir Dinge einfordern, die Spaß machen: Eine grüne, co2-freie Weltwirtschaft und Barbecues. Denn Kohle ist nur zum Grillen da!
admin
8 Mrz 09 at 22:43
war überhaupt nicht viel Aufwand!!! hat insgesamt vielleicht 20 Minuten gedauert, auf zwei Tage verteilt. Und Spass hats auch gemacht!!!!
Sandra
20 Mrz 09 at 14:27
Hello! Gruesse aus Australien!
I like this idea and I’m inclined to join the movement.
There’s an issue I’d like to raise. If I put myself in a critic’s shoes for a moment (think right-wing journalist who wants to make people like us look stupid), I can’t help but ask why people who want the world to stop supporting the coal industry are encouraging the world to buy coal. Imagine telling people to mail whale meat to their heads of state to encourage an end to whaling.
I think it would be very helpful to your cause if you made it *very* clear that what you’re sending to these politicians is NOT COAL but *charcoal*. BBQ fuel is charcoal, which is made by burning hardwood; it’s not coal. This raises another question: Where is this charcoal coming from, and how sustainable is the process? I’ve done a little bit of looking around online and it seems that most commercially available bbq charcoal comes from unsustainable forestry practices (eg. http://www.bbc.co.uk/bloom/actions/sustainablebbq.shtml).
It might be a good idea to encourage people to send SUSTAINABLY PRODUCED CHARCOAL to their heads of state, not coal. Maybe try to find a company that sells only sustainable BBQ charcoal and encourage everyone to buy their product. That way, you’ll be supporting a sustainable business, keeping your protest self-consistent and making a strong point to the world.
Here’s another opportunity for a powerful symbol in your movement: Encourage the politicians to BURY the charcoal, NOT burn it. I saw a comment on the main feed that the obvious thing to do with the ‘coal’ after the politicians receive it is to have a big BBQ and burn it all. This seems counterproductive to me, given that burning charcoal produces pure CO2, exactly the thing that we’re trying to stop producing. BURYING the charcoal will SEQUESTER the carbon, keeping it out of the atmosphere. It may also help to fertilise soil, which will help more plants to grow, thereby sequestering more carbon. I think that would be a powerful symbol to the world and it would make the politicians look good, as well as your movement, which makes it more likely to happen.
Please think carefully about how you set up this movement. I REALLY LIKE THE IDEA and I can also see a lot of potential for it to backfire if it’s not done well.
Viel Glueck!
Drew.
Drew
6 Apr 09 at 09:48
Dear Drew,
thank you very much for your comment. I am psyched to see that the idea travels around the world, even to Australia. I have been so far unable to find organic-charcoal here in Berlin, there is apparently only sustainable charcoal in the south of the uk. and one german guy making it on the phillipines. What I love about coalforobama is that everybody can protest from home, decentrally. Ideally they should use sustainable coal, but the world is not perfect. And I think voicing protest right now has priority over doing everything the zero carbon way. This proteset is about changing the paradigms of our economy.
Sequestering would be a good idea, there was a great discussion of the pros and cons of “biochar” as they call it on the guardian recently: http://tinyurl.com/c8vuf6 So it could help, but it is not the miracle cure.
But I still think that we as activists have to have fun to. What is killing the planet is coal burned for heating, electricity etc. not the amounts of barbecues;)
Keep us posted on what you do in australia!
Daniel
7 Apr 09 at 21:44