Sierra Club plans protest at BP gas station

BP’s oil spill in the Gulf has spread over 2,000 square miles of water but it does not seem to have impacted customer attitudes about the company, the Associated Press reports.

The Sierra Club Michigan Chapter wants to change this and will attempt to raise awareness of BP’s responsibility for the disaster by staging a demonstration tomorrow at the BP station at 12 Mile Road and Woodward in Royal Oak tomorrow at 5pm.

“We want to demonstrate a Michigan response and show that we are in solidarity with the folks who are dealing with this disaster in the Gulf,” said Sierra Club organizer Tiffany Hartung, “We also want to show that this spill is a wake up call, that we need clean energy. We want to make sure BP is held responsible, and we are calling for a moratorium on off-shore drilling.”

According to AP, after the Exxon Valdez oil spill consumers organized a boycott of Exxon gas and 10,000 returned credit cards issued by the company.

Sierra Club chapters across the county are calling for the Obama administration to hold BP responsible for the damage caused by the spill.

In a statement yesterday Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said:

BP’s recklessness has destroyed vital fishing and tourism industries in the Gulf Coast, just as Wall Street’s greed and recklessness knocked down America’s economy.

This disaster is a wake up call. We can no longer afford to wait to wean ourselves from dirty oil. There are thousands of drilling rigs off our coasts. How many disasters like this have to happen before we stop our desperate search for oil and finally embrace clean energy?

We don’t need to drill our coasts. We already have the technology available to run our cars on electricity that can be generated from clean energy like wind and solar power. You don’t hear about disasters like this at wind farms or solar plants.

The fishing industry in Louisiana could be impacted to the tune of $2.5 billion, and Florida’s tourism losses are expected to total around $3 billion. BP needs to compensate all of those hardworking people in the fishing and tourism industries who will now be struggling to feed their families. BP needs to pay to restore coastal wetlands and ensure the recovery of any wildlife that do survive this disaster.