Yesterday, we wrote about how Chevron is damaging communities in Nigeria but sadly, they are not the only region affected by Chevron's oil pollution.

30,000 Ecuadoreans have been challenging Chevron for almost two decades. They want Chevron to take responsiblity for the oil pollution in the Amazon. This pollution has caused a water emergency in local Ecuadorean communities. The lack of clean water has created a health crisis causing a number of ailments including miscarriages, cancer, and birth defects.

They have suffered because of Chevron's destructive acts but they continue to fight for justice and for themselves. Clearwater is a community led project that supplies the Ecuadorean Amazon with safe drinking water. This project is a necessity as they continue to fight Chevron in hopes that one day they will be held accountable for the contamination they have caused.

Please support Clearwater by sharing about the project.

Watch this video to learn more:

Read more about Chevron's destructive practices in Nigeria and around the world here.

350.org has launched a new campaign to stop oil subsidies that give tax breaks to companies like Chevron. Our tax dollars are contributing to destruction in places like Nigeria and it looks like the American public wants no part of this. Over 100,000 people have signed a new bill to put an end these handouts.

Here in California, 350.org has put together two events to put pressure on Chevron.

Please join environmental leaders from Nigeria, Angola, Brazil, and Ecuador at a teach-in in Berkeley and a protest at a Chevron shareholder meeting. Details below:

WHAT: Teach-In On The True Cost of Chevron
WHEN: May 29, 2012
WHERE: David Brower Center, Berkeley
More info & RSVP on Facebook.

WHAT: 99% Spring Protest Outside Chevron’s Shareholder Meeting
WHEN: May 30, 2012
WHERE: Chevron HQ, 6001 Bollinger Canyon Rd., San Ramon, CA
More info & RSVP on Facebook.

Lakota Activists were arrested in Kyle, North Dakota for disorderly conduct for forming a blockade to stop tar sands mining equipment from passing through their land.

Debra White Plume, one of the activists talked about these mining trucks:

"They each carried a 'treater vessel' which is used to separate gas and oil and other elements. Each weighs 229,155 pounds, and is valued at $1,259,593, according to the papers we got from the truck drivers."
"They said their office in Canada made the route with the State of South Dakota to cross the Pine Ridge rez in order to avoid paying the state of South Dakota $50,000 per truck."  

Read more about it here

Watch Video of the action:

If built, Keystone XL will transport up to 35 million gallons of oil everyday through a 1,700 mile pipeline in Canada’s tar sands. The oil would travel to refineries in Texas and exported globally. This pipeline would only increase our fossil fuel dependence and speed up climate change while destroying and polluting the land and water.

Not only is it a dirty energy source, building this pipeline threatens freshwater supplies for millions and the habitats and lives of at least 20 endangered species would be in peril.

Right now in the Senate, an amendment to a transportation bill would allow for this pipeline to be built. This tar sands pipeline must be opposed to halt the construction of Keystone XL. Please contact your Senators now to ask them to oppose this amendment. Immediate action is required as a vote is expected soon.

Please take action by March 31, 2012.

Take action here.

Here is the content of the sample letter provided by The Center for Biological Diversity:

Subject: Please Oppose the Keystone XL Pipeline

Dear Senator,

I am writing to ask you to oppose the amendment to the transportation bill that would approve the Keystone XL pipeline.  

The proposed pipeline would cross U.S. wetlands, rivers, agricultural and drinking-water resources and wildlife habitat. An earlier Keystone pipeline has already leaked 14 times since 2010, and the Keystone XL pipeline is certain to spill as well. The risks of approving the Keystone XL pipeline are simply too great. Indeed, many landowners are resisting eminent domain because they don't want their land polluted by spills.

Canada's tar-sands development is one of the most destructive and dangerous activities on Earth. First, extracting oil from Canada's tar sands destroys boreal forest and wetlands where migratory birds breed; second, burning that oil creates massive, additional global warming pollution that will help commit us to devastating climate damage.

If this weren't bad enough, the Keystone XL pipeline will allow for export of dirty tar-sands oil to the global market: The American public will bear all of the pipeline's risks to line the pockets of multinational oil companies. 

I urge you to reject the amendment to the transportation bill that approves this controversial and harmful pipeline.

There is significant need among grassroots nonprofit organizations for capacity building and support services that Party Corps provide. 

Party Corps aims to build lasting community support and attract new members for our beneficiaries.  All proceeds from events go directly to the featured local cause. 

In the past, Party Corps has operated as an informal social network, throwing all volunteer-run events to raise money and support for Bay Area organizations.  We have seen how music can motivate and galvanize a community of active citizens.  Now, Party Corps is transitioning to a formal structure so we can produce better events and support more good causes.

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Compressed air cars are well and truly on their way to mass production in India and America, among other places - although they seem to be taking their time. But the cheap, environmentally-neutral compressed air engine also lends itself to other interesting urban and industrial transport concepts like the AIRPod. Intended both as a personal 3-4 seater city commuter and as a getabout for airport, train station and municipal workers, the AIRPod is cute and easy to drive with a joystick instead of a steering wheel and pedals. The three-wheel transport weighs around the same as a touring motorcycle at 220kg, so it only needs 5 1/2 horsepower from its lightweight air engine to reach top speeds a little over 40mph. Best of all, cheap compressed air refilling will take as little as 90 seconds and cost about EU1.10 for the AIRPod's expected 220km range.

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Right when the media were declaring the movement to be in decline, a massive global day of action radically reversed the expectations of the skeptics.

Imagine you had been asleep for the past year or so, and you suddenly woke up and tuned into today’s news: clashes in Rome and Milan, mass demonstrations in Athens, an uprising in Damascus, sit-ins in San Francisco, arrests in Madrid, huge protests in Chile, an enormous rally in New York, a worldwide student strike, and so on. Depending on whether you’re a career politician or an unemployed revolutionary, you’d either shit your pants in agony or jump through the roof in joy.

Having been attentively following and covering this movement from the very first day of the Egyptian Revolution — with an article entitled “The Global Revolutionary Wave of 2011?” — we have always hammered on the idea that this whole thing would spread, go global, and keep growing exponentially. But even I, the hopelessly naive romantic — obsessed as I was throughout my youth with 1789, 1848, 1917 and 1968 — had never expected to live through anything like this. Witnessing what 2011 has bloomed into just leaves me speechless.

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A general assembly drew thousands to Sproul Plaza, the historic site where Berkeley's free speech movement began.

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Poster for the Rack-n-Roll Benefit Concert

1. Tell our readers what exactly Wine, Woman & Song is all about.

Wine, Women & Song® started out in 1998, as bar room concerts supporting the fight against breast cancer. After producing the first show with one volunteer (the late Howard Fargo), more volunteers arrived on the scene and have been with me ever since, such as Ualtar O'Regan, Eileen Grady and Austin Wondolowski. My mother is a two time breast cancer survivor, hence my passion for this cause.

2. How did you get started putting on the Rack and Roll Breastival concerts?

The first few years we had indie artists playing their original tunes. That morphed into a show with one band, lots of singers, all doing covers by artists who've had breast cancer, i.e. Sheryl Crow, Melissa Etheridge, Dusty Springfield, Carly Simon, and many more.

Diplomatic sanctions were imposed on Iceland in an attempt to halt their commercial fin whale hunting. It is a definite win for the whales and the President’s actions should be recognized and applauded.

These sanctions mean the US will support and put efforts towards ending commercial whaling in Iceland as set by International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whaling.

Below are the details of the Presidents actions and described to a letter to congress:

1. Relevant U.S. delegations attending meetings with Icelandic officials and senior Administration officials visiting Iceland to raise U.S. concerns regarding commercial whaling by Icelandic companies and seek ways to halt such action;

2. Cabinet secretaries to evaluate the appropriateness of visits to Iceland depending on continuation of the current suspension of fin whaling;

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