http://understory.ran.org The Understory is the official blog of Rainforest Action Network. Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:12:36 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en From RAN's Dana Clarke We’ve just learned that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has sent a very legalistic letter to Marfork Coal Company, the Massey Energy subsidiary that is blasting on Coal River Mountain. The letter follows up on an EPA site visit to Coal River Mountain earlier this month, and ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/20/breaking-news-epa-challenges-massey-over-coal-river-mountain/ Here are a couple of great articles by lefty author Naomi Klein about the anti-corporate movement of movements which converged in Seattle in 1999 at the shutdown of the World Trade Organization are re-converging around climate change in Copenhagen. In both, Klein talks about how anti-establishment direct action movement are preparing ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/20/naomi-klein-seattle-movements-coming-of-age-in-copenhagen/ Bill McKibben, Gloria Reuben, and RAN's own Mike Brune have all sent letters to JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon asking him to stop JPMC's financing of the coal industry and mountaintop removal coal mining. We got word today that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. just sent his letter to Jamie Dimon. ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/19/robert-f-kennedy-jr-requests-meeting-with-jamie-dimon-re-mtr/ Mr. Watson, how will you respond? Yesterday Rainforest Action Network’s executive director Mike Brune sent a letter to Chevron’s incoming CEO John Watson and made him an offer.  Come with us to Ecuador.  To our knowledge no senior Chevron official has toured Texaco’s former oil installations in Ecuador’s rainforest.  [Chevron acquired ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/18/mr-watson-how-will-you-respond/ Seriously, if you aren’t going to be Copenhagen, ask yourself why won’t you be in West Virginia defending Coal River Mountain on Dec 7? As climate justice movements turn towards the floundering talks in Denmark, people in Appalachia are in the fight of their lives to save Coal River Mountain and ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/17/save-coal-river-mountain-rally-and-protest-charleston-wv-dec-7-at-2pm/ Here in Riau, Indonesia, signs of the struggle to save the last of Sumatra's forest is everywhere. Daily, the papers cover stories of timber and oil palm companies destroying forests, engaging in corruption, driving land conflicts, sponsoring violence, and marginalizing indigenous peoples. Today, on the way to a meeting with the ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/15/sumatra-hunger-strike-the-last-recourse-for-a-forest-community/ On the first day of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) Pak Jamaluddin was quiet. He said the air conditioning of Kuala Lumpor gave him the flu. He seemed lost among the groups of palm producers, with their Blackberries and dark suits. Exhausted from the canoe rides, bad roads, the ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/14/rspo-dispatch-duta-palma-destroys-rainforests-and-lives/ Could it be that a tiny fly is the secret to saving Appalachia's mountains and drinking water from the destructive mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR) practice? According to Kevin Book, an analyst at ClearView Energy Partners LLC, in a Bloomberg piece this morning: “The future of mountaintop mining looks bleak.” For the ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/13/appalachias-spotted-owl-will-a-tiny-fly-stop-mountaintop-removal-mining/ Written by Dave Vasey from RAN Toronto. On Tuesday, RAN activists disrupted a speech by Gordon Nixon, president of RBC at Ryerson University. Nixon was speaking as part of a business conference on Canadian Manufacturing. RAN activists interrupted the speech four times with banners and comments, as well as once during ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/12/ran-toronto-publicly-shames-rbc-ceo-gordon-nixon/ So we're in the midst of a campaign to save Coal River Mountain and end mountaintop removal. About two weeks ago, on a Nation Day of Action to End Mountaintop Removal, dozens of actions happened around the country targeting the EPA, coal financier JP Morgan Chase and other political,utility ... http://understory.ran.org/2009/11/11/massey-cited-for-blasting-on-coal-river-mountain/