This is the letter for week 3 of a weekly climate strike that went on for 4 years in front of SF City Hall, beginning early March 2019. For more context, see this story. For an annotated table of contents to all the strike letters, see this story.
STRIKE FOR THE PLANET
while we can still make any difference at all, cause it’s now or never
It won’t be cheap, or easy, or politically feasible, or pro-capitalist, or any of the rest of the nonsense we’ve let blind us to both the science and the screaming of the biosphere as it dies.
But we have to do it, and we have to do it now.
So let’s talk about CARBON SEQUESTRATION.
Carbon sequestration means pulling carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it. The carbon for sequestration comes from atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) – both potent greenhouse gases. Besides ending the dumping of carbon into the air, we must now remove it.
So how can we, in SF, sequester carbon?
We must:
plant trees, lots of trees, everywhere possible
expand the idea of where it is possible to plant trees
use only organic farming and gardening practices in SF
practice permaculture and regenerative farming/gardening in SF
create large numbers of wildlife, native plant, and pollinator gardens
ban the use of all inorganic fertilizer
plant deep rooted native plants
garden for humification
require rooftop planting
require sidewalk planting
surface all creeks and rivers in SF
plant seagrass, tule, and marsh grasses
restore and extend all historical marshlands
minimize all plowing, tilling, and digging
increase area available for planting
no bare soil
no pesticides, weed killers, fungicides, or grub control chemicals
plant polycultures always everywhere
use organic manure for fertilizer
make compost, composted manure, and mulch available to all gardeners
Where:
at all schools and city buildings
at all new construction (growing space equal to square footage of construction)
on all parking facilities and all sidewalks
on all roofs and at all houses
in all city parks
along all of the coastline