Photo courtesy of Rainforest Action Network via Flickr.
Climate activists have begun demonstrating against the U.S. government’s use of fossil fuels which, according to studies from the International Energy Agency, are the primary driver of climate change.
By Sarah Grinnell ’26
Science and Environment Editor
According to The Washington Post, the hordes of climate protestors that flooded New York City this past Sunday sent an incendiary message to U.S. politicians: the heat is turning up on the planet and in the streets.
From Sunday, Sept. 18 into, Monday, Sept. 19, thousands of demonstrators overwhelmed Midtown Manhattan with a raucous call on the U.S. government to terminate the use of all fossil fuels, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Burning fossil fuels, such as coal, oil and natural gas, remains the primary driver of global warming, National Public Radio reported. According to scientific studies by the International Energy Agency cited in a New York Times article, all fossil fuel projects must cease “if the world is to stay within relatively safe levels of atmospheric warming.”
Molly Malloy ’26, who attended the march, described the atmosphere of the event as “invigorating.”
“[It was] like 75,000 people shared a single thought, a single forward-thinking goal. It was an angry crowd, a crowd of people who had been disappointed and had their trust broken time and time again,” they said.
Prior to the march, protestors sent an open letter to President Joe Biden, demanding an end to federal approval of oil and gas developments, The Washington Post reported. Although the Biden administration has been progressive on many fronts of climate policy, such as the initiation of the ambitious Inflation Reduction Act, which sets aside billions of dollars in “incentives for renewable energy and other low-carbon technologies,” it has also controversially continued to issue licenses for new oil and gas projects due to legal obligations, NPR reported. NPR named the Willow Project, a large-scale oil extraction in Alaska, as well as the Mountain Valley Pipeline in West Virginia as among the most notable.
The New York Times reported that representatives from the White House insist “President Biden has treated climate change as an emergency — the existential threat of our time — since day one," citing the millions of acres of land made off-limits to oil and gas extraction, as well as the recently canceled permits in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. However, activists are demanding more action, and they want it now. Alice Hu, a senior climate campaigner at New York Communities for Change, emphasizes in The New York Times article that “the U.S. remains one of the world's largest oil and gas producers,” and thus the Biden administration needs to “do more” if he does not wish to alienate younger voters in the 2024 election.
The consensus of the protest was clear, with many of the demonstrators using their presence as an ultimatum: if Biden does not rise to the demands of the climate crisis, he will not have their vote for the next presidential election, The New York Times explained. According to the same article, the cries of the activists show that U.S. citizens are pressuring Biden to follow through as the “climate president” he painted himself to be in his initial campaign pledges.
Malloy expressed a similar view, saying, “Biden has neglected his promises as a politician, like putting forward a pipeline when he touted himself as the candidate that would address the climate crisis.” Thus, they believe it will be necessary for voters to be “extremely conscious of politician’s stances on climate change before they vote,” as well as continue to hold politicians and corporations accountable.
“Industries and polluters do everything in their power to deflect responsibility to consumers, telling us that as long as we shop sustainably, recycle, [we can] reduce our carbon footprint” when, in reality, the corporations and governing bodies are really the ones to blame, Malloy said. “As long as we have politicians in power that refuse to instate and encourage the change necessary, nothing will get better, and humanity will suffer the consequences."
Malloy conveyed that the protest was empowering, as “it’s so hard to be part of a crowd so large and passionate without feeling hopeful for change.” However, they also noted that “the anger and frustration being expressed definitely affected the mood of the march.”
Echoing the comments of Hu, Malloy expressed that “every day we plead our elected officials to do better, to save our lives, but they continue to fall short [time and time again] in taking effective measures to address the climate crisis.”
Hence, the motivation of the protest. The consequences of climate change become more catastrophic as the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold draws nearer, NPR reported. This number was established at the United Nations Paris Agreement to denote the point-of-no-return for global temperatures in order to stave off the worst effects of climate change, according to NPR. Calls for climate action have grown louder, angrier and more desperate than ever, NPR explained. At the Sunday protest, 114 demonstrators were arrested after blocking the entrance to a Federal Reserve building, The Wall Street Journal reported.
According to Malloy, this shift in climate protest was only going to be inevitable as the effects of inaction reap greater consequences. “When nonviolence becomes ineffective, there's only one place to turn,” they said. “Protests and demonstrations have become more agitated because the people are angry!”
“We're watching our planet die while the people on top just sit and laugh as we scream and beg for a sustainable future, a future that our children and grandchildren and everyone we love can live in without melting, suffocating or being washed away,” Malloy said. “Civil disobedience is the only way to grab and hold a politician's attention, and only when ‘normalcy’ is interrupted will movements progress. We have been failed repeatedly by the world's nations breaking their promises, and grassroots climate action is the key to instigate change.”
According to a Common Dreams article, New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez offered a similar sentiment in her address to protestors at the event, naming climate change as “the biggest issue of our time” and thus stressing that U.S. citizens must therefore “be too big and too radical to ignore,” their tactics intensifying with the urgency of the situation.
As such, while Malloy stressed the undercurrent of anger and frustration present in the protestors’ pleas, they also drew attention to their hopes that the protest would serve as a boost to the climate movement.
“We cannot underestimate the power of the people when united towards a common, and drastic, goal,” Malloy said.
By continuing to pressure politicians and corporations for lasting, structural change, Malloy says that “if the goals of the climate justice movement are lasting change, then I believe lasting change will be achieved.”