Climate activists ‘prepared to risk lives’ to stop German coalmine
Hundreds of climate activists who have barricaded themselves in a protest camp on the site of an abandoned village in western Germany have said they are prepared to risk their lives to prevent it from being mined for coal.
Lützerath in North Rhine Westphalia (NRW) has been emptied of its residents, who have all been relocated. An estimated 700 anti-coal protesters, who started occupying the deserted village and surroundings two and a half years ago, squatting in empty houses, outbuildings and farmland, are preparing for a showdown with police after eviction orders were issued by a local court that are valid from Tuesday. The number of protesters has grown in recent weeks as hundreds of activists from Germany and around the world join the protest.
Police are expected to start a clearance operation this week, including removing protesters from tall tripod pillars made from bamboo poles, to pave the way for the energy company RWE to mine the site for lignite.
The German government says the operation is necessary as the country reduces its dependence on Russian gas and oil.
On Monday, a struggle broke out amid a growing police presence at the site, with some activists throwing fireworks, bottles and stones at police, before officers pulled back.
The head of the Aachen police force, Dirk Weinspach, who is responsible for leading the clearance operation, has become a particular figure of distrust for protesters after openly admitting his own allegiance to their cause as a member of the Greens party, but insisting he could do nothing to stop their eviction. He recently told activists he shared their concerns about “further warming of the Earth and the consequences of that if we fail to adhere to the internationally agreed goal of 1.5 degrees”. But he said if the police were to decide on what laws and regulations to enforce, it would “amount to the beginnings of despotic rule” and he therefore had no choice but to begin the evictions.
Lützerath and surrounding villages have been in the spotlight of climate activism since at least 2013 when Germany’s constitutional court ruled that allowing the extension of the Garzweiler opencast brown coalmine was overwhelmingly in the public interest.
Activists had hoped the entry into the German government of the environmentally friendly Greens a year ago might lead to the decision being overturned.
Instead, the Greens’ economy minister, Robert Habeck, and Mona Neubauer, the economy minister of NRW, also of the Greens, reached a compromise agreement last year with
RWE to bring forward Germany’s coal phaseout in the region by eight years to 2030, with the company agreeing to save five villages planned for demolition and already cleared of people and only destroy Lützerath, as part of its expansion plans. This will still give it access to about 280m tonnes of coal.
About 900 people were forced to leave their homes and the local Catholic church, completed in 1891, was deconsecrated before being destroyed five years ago. More recently, wind turbines were removed to make way for the mine.
Habeck, who has found himself in the extremely uncomfortable position of turning from a long-term campaigner against fossil fuels to a shortterm defender of them, said: “Putin’s war of aggression is forcing us to temporarily make greater use of lignite so that we save gas in electricity generation. This is painful but necessary in view of the shortage of gas.”
The climate activists of the Lützi Bleibt (Lützi Stays) movement, who are inhabiting tents, wooden huts and tree houses on the site, and being given food and other provisions by a growing number of supporters, argue the plans are fatal for the goals of keeping global heating below 1.5C over pre-industrial levels and fly in the face of Germany’s international reputation as a trailblazer for environmental issues.
The fate of the farming village that dates back to at least the 12th century has become inextricably linked to the debate over Germany’s commitment to stop burning coal, which is considered one of the most polluting sources of energy.
Germany’s leading climate activist, Luisa Neubauer, who visited the site earlier this week, is furious with her own party. “The Greens have capitulated to RWE; the activists will not,” she said.
An activist from Berlin, who said they had dropped out of their studies to join the protest, said: “We have the willpower to stay here for as long as it takes, and provisions to last us for at least six weeks. We don’t talk about the risk to our lives, we’re beyond thinking that, but I know that everyone here has it in the back of their minds but thinks inaction would be much, much worse.”