Indigenous Resistors Are Staving off Tons of Fossil-Fuel Emissions

The equivalent of roughly 400 new coal-fired plants in the US and Canada, a study finds.

Keeli Little Leaf from the Warm Springs tribe participates in a 2017 protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline in Portland, Oregon. Alex Milan Tracy/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

recent report by Indigenous Environmental Network, or IEN, and Oil Change International, or OCI, found that Indigenous-led resistance to 21 fossil fuel projects in the US and Canada over the past decade has stopped or delayed an amount of greenhouse gas pollution equivalent to at least one-quarter of annual US and Canadian emissions. 

This is despite an onslaught of attacks against Indigenous activists over the past few years. Over the last few years, victories won against projects through direct actions have led to more than 35 states enacting anti-protest lawsjail time for protestors, thousands of dollars of fines, and even the killing of prominent activists.

In the face of criminalization and demonization of those fighting to move beyond fossil fuel use, Indigenous resistance can show us a way out, says Dallas Goldtooth, an organizer with IEN, an alliance of Indigenous peoples who believe in adhering to Indigenous knowledge and natural law

“Our movements are stronger when we connect the dots,” he told Grist. “What Indigenous peoples are providing is a roadmap for our allies and supporters to adopt as a way to address the climate crisis.”

Indigenous rights and responsibilities, the report explains, “are far more than rhetorical devices—they are tangible structures impacting the viability of fossil fuel expansion.” Through physically disrupting construction and legally challenging projects, Indigenous resistance has directly stopped projects expected to produce 780 million metric tons of greenhouse gases every year and is actively fighting projects that would dump more than 800 million metric tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere every year. 

The analysis, which used publicly released data and calculations from nine different environmental and oil regulation groups, found that roughly 1.587 billion metric tons of annual greenhouse gas emissions have been halted. That’s the equivalent pollution of approximately 400 new coal-fired power plants—more than are still operating in the United States and Canada—or roughly 345 million passenger vehicles—more than all vehicles on the road in these countries.

“From an Indigenous perspective, when we are confronting the climate crisis we are inherently confronting the systems of colonization and white supremacy as well,” Goldtooth said. “In order to do that, you have to reevaluate how you relate to the world around you and define what your obligations are to the world around you. It’s more than just stopping fracking development and pipelines and it’s more than just developing clean energy, it’s about actually fundamentally changing how we see the world itself.”

The report and data analysis by Goldtooth, Alberto Saldamando, and Tom Goldtooth of IEN and Kyle Gracey and Collin Rees of OCI, is meant to dispel the myth that land defenders and those on the frontlines of the struggles against fossil fuel projects are not making an impact. The work is cause to celebrate, Goldtooth says. 

“When you take a step back and look at the work that Indigenous peoples have put in over the years and decades, it really goes to show that we collectively are making a tremendous impact for the benefit of this planet,” Goldtooth told Grist. 

“It backs up what we’ve constantly been saying,” he added, “recognizing Indigenous Rights protects the water, protects the land, and protects our futures.” 

Deliberately the report highlights both major fights, such as the victory against the Keystone XL pipeline and the ongoing fights against the Dakota Access and Line 3 pipelines, and lesser-known battles taking place against the Mountain Valley Gas Pipeline in West Virginia and the Rio Grande liquified natural gas export terminal in Texas. 

“The ultimate hope of the report was to show folks that we are winning, and we can win,” Goldtooth said, “and these struggles are connected and onto themselves are an ecosystem that is paving the way for a better world.”

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate