SYDNEY, July 6, 2018 – Dozens of Greenpeace activists have staged a peaceful protest at a Citibank branch in Sydney’s CBD, calling on the global lender to cut its ties with Canadian tar sands pipeline projects that threaten Indigenous rights, water and marine life.Citi is among 12 global banks identified by Greenpeace which continue to have ties to toxic tar sands projects and pipeline companies like Energy Transfer Partners, the company that built the highly controversial Dakota Access Pipeline.
“Citi continues to fund destructive tar sands projects, including directly and indirectly supporting pipelines actively opposed by Indigenous sovereign First Nations and Tribes in North America. These are projects that the world and our climate cannot afford,” Greenpeace activist Stephane Cytryn said.
“Tar sands oil are among the dirtiest fossil fuels on the planet, producing up to 200 per cent more carbon emissions than conventional oil and banks like Citi should not help to unleash these emissions on the planet at a time when we desperately need to speed up the transition to clean renewable energy.
“Together with people in Canada, the US, UK, Spain and around the world, we are building a wave of resistance to keep these dirty banks from putting the future of people and the planet at risk.”
Earlier this year, oil pipeline company Kinder Morgan abandoned the Trans Mountain Expansion Project announcing it would sell it to the Canadian government — a move that signaled just how risky these projects are.
If this 1,150 km pipeline project goes forward it will transport tar sands from Alberta to the coast of British Columbia, where the oil will then be loaded on to tankers to be transported by sea along the west coast of North America. The new pipeline would increase the amount of crude oil carried from the current 300,000 barrels per day, to 890,000 and lead to a seven fold increase in tanker traffic through the Salish Sea. A spill of this heavy, highly toxic tar sands oil in those waters would permanently damage coastal communities and wildlife, placing the remaining 75 endangered Southern Resident orcas in the Puget Sound at risk of extinction.
“In such a massive climate crisis, it’s unconscionable to continue financing tar sands expansion projects. Especially when modern technologies such as renewables offer plenty of long-term solutions that make sense both economically and environmentally,” Cytryn said.
For photos:
https://media.greenpeace.org/shoot/27MZIFJW5O8Q2
For interviews:
Martin Zavan, Greenpeace Australia Pacific Communications Campaigner
0424 295 422
