Climate activists have used dye to turn the fountains in multiple German cities green, in protest against the government’s decision to use liquefied natural gas to compensate for significantly reduced gas imports from Russia.
It might look like St Patrick’s Day celebrations a few months late, but the reason why the water in many German monuments turned green on Wednesday morning was actually to protest the government’s environmental policy.
Responding to the German-government-supported EU decision to recently categorise gas as “sustainable”, activists from Extinction Rebellion organised a coordinated protest, dying fountains in Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Bonn and Essen, among other places, green, and writing next to them the message “LNG - unfortunately not green (Leider Nicht Grün). The activists used uranine, a dye used by water companies that is harmless to humans, animals and the environment.
Alongside pictures of the Hygieia- & Vierländerin fountains in Hamburg dyed green, Extinction Rebellion Deutschland tweeted, “But gas is a fossil fuel and is partly fracked. Fracking is banned in large parts of Europe but [German Economics Minister] Habeck is importing fracking gas.”
Im Juni hat die EU-Kommission mit dt. Zustimmung Gas als "nachhaltig" eingestuft. Gas ist aber fossil und wird teilweise gefrackt. Fracking ist in großen Teilen Europas verboten, dennoch lässt Habeck Frackinggas importieren.#SystemChange! Hamburg: Hygieia- & Vierländerinbrunnen pic.twitter.com/qhupYdycBT
In another tweet, Extinction Rebellion Deutschland said that liquefied natural gas “leads to neo-colonial exploitation and oppression in addition to environmentally harmful consequences.”
In addition to the energy-intensive LNG liquefaction, escaping methane ensures that fracking gas has a worse climate footprint than hard coal. To call this a "green" bridging technology is hardly to be surpassed in absurdity! Schalenbrunnen (Munich), Neptunbrunnen (Berlin) pic.twitter.com/nvt3gtyi2v
LNG or liquefied natural gas comes from deep within the earth’s crust and is sometimes extracted using a process called fracking, which requires chemicals and large amounts of water and is generally considered hugely destructive for local ecosystems. The production, liquefaction, transport and sale of LNG are also responsible for large amounts of methane emissions, a greenhouse gas.
By building new terminals for liquefied natural gas, Germany is looking to expand its supply of gas imports from countries other than Russia.
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Abi studied History & German at the University of Manchester. She has since worked as a writer, editor and content marketeer, but still has a soft spot for museums, castles...
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