We Have 12 Years to Stop Climate Catastrophe. These Young Activists Have a Plan.

In the wake of the stark U.N. report, direct-action groups like Sunrise Movement and Extinction Rebellion are out to disrupt the fossil fuel economy.

On a clear and sunny morning in San Francisco’s downtown SoMa district, 40 people stand side by side with interlinked arms blocking the entrance to the San Francisco Federal Building.  Just a couple of weeks ago this city was shrouded in a suffocating blanket of wildfire smoke that had traveled down from giant blazes in the north.  But the haze has since cleared, and its absence has revealed a clarity of vision which stretches far beyond a healthier air quality index.

“I’m here today because we have a 12-year deadline,” Lydia Macy, 18, told HuffPost from behind a 40-foot banner that she was helping to hold up.  “Climate change is the No. 1 issue that we’re facing in the 21st century, and if we don’t fight we won’t have a world to live in.”

A student at Berkeley High School, Macy was joined by hundreds of others in this action organized by the Bay Area chapter of Sunrise Movement — a youth-led organization with the mission to stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process.  Sunrise Movement’s most recent campaign has been focused on putting pressure on members of Congress to support Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) in pushing for a Green New Deal, a policy proposal aiming to ensure a just and rapid transition to a decarbonized economy.

Following a day of sit-ins and protests on Monday outside the Capitol Hill office of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) — which drew in thousands and saw more than 130 arrested — the action in San Francisco on Tuesday also targeted Pelosi, whose local district office was just on the other side of the demonstrators’ human barricade.

Read more at We Have 12 Years to Stop Climate Catastrophe.  These Young Activists Have a Plan.