Chippewas Solidarity
In solidarity for Indigenous rights.
Chippewas of the Thames First Nation is taking a stand in the Supreme Court of Canada to assert their rights as an Indigenous community. They are challenging the Canadian government to recognise and uphold its responsibilities under treaty. COTTFN’s court case challenges the lack of consultation they received for Enbridge’s Line 9 pipeline project, but its implications go far beyond this one pipeline. The outcome of this case will impact future decisions for extractive industry and land use in relation to treaty and inherent Indigenous rights. Stand with COTTFN to uphold Indigenous rights.
Defending Deshkaan Ziibi: Challenging the Line 9 Pipeline (from Jadis on Vimeo.)
In solidarity for healthy communities.
Line 9 is adding to the toxic burden borne by communities at its terminus and at the sources of the products it transports. Aamjiwnaang, an Anishinaabe community near Sarnia, Ontario, is surrounded by petrochemical refineries that routinely emit toxic chemicals, giving this community among the worst air quality in the country. Tar sands extraction is also a major source of the emission of toxic chemicals into the air. Cancer rates in communities downstream of the tar sands, including Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation and Mikisew Cree First Nation, are staggering, with carcinogenic contaminants accumulating in animals as well. Extraction from the Alberta tar sands has left the Athabasca river toxic, making it no longer possible for communities to live off of the food systems it once supported. Fracking in North Dakota is contributing to health impacts that are only beginning to be known, with carcinogens and endocrine disruptors found among the hundreds of chemicals involved in the extraction process. Stopping the Line 9 project is part of challenging these broader systems that pollute bodies as they pollute the air, water, and land. Stand with COTTFN for healthy communities.
In solidarity for clean water.
COTTFN is challenging a pipeline project that portends devastating consequences for the water. Enbridge’s Line 9 project crosses well over 100 waterways, and risks the health of each and every one of them by transporting tar sands bitumen and fracked oil. It crosses the Deshkaan Ziibi, or “Thames River”, watershed--which the community harvests from--in at least seven locations. A spill of bitumen, as we have seen in the Kalamazoo River with another Enbridge pipeline the same age and design as Line 9, cannot be cleaned up. Line 9 has already suffered 35 significant spills in its operational history, and now with even more dangerous, toxic products inside, a spill spells death to water. The tar sands themselves result in 400 million gallons of water a day rendered toxic and dumped as waste, with fracking similarly creating vast quantities of poisoned wastewater. Stand with COTTFN to protect the water.
Click for a detailed map of Line 9
In solidarity against climate change.
Line 9, like any method of transporting tar sands and fracked oil, has consequences beyond its particular route. By supporting the expansion of the tar sands and fracking, it facilitates climate change, and contributes to pollution at the sites of extraction and refinement. The Alberta tar sands constitute the largest industrial project on the planet. Tar sands extraction and upgrading emits 3-4.5 times more greenhouse gases than conventional North American crude oil, and Alberta’s greenhouse gas emissions have sharply increased over the past 25 years of tar sands extraction. Tar sands extraction and fracking, supported by pipelines, is leading the world toward climate catastrophe. Stand with COTTFN to stop climate change.
In solidarity against Line 9.
COTTFN’s challenge is part of a large movement against Line 9 and against tar sands expansion more broadly. Communities across the continent are coming together to stop these industrial projects that are wreaking havoc upon the environment and are carried out with disregard and disrespect for treaty rights. Line 9 poses too great a threat to COTTFN, and every community along its route and at the source of the oil it carries. Stand with COTTFN to challenge Enbridge’s devastating pipeline project.
