Last Saturday, 3.2.24, dozens of climate activists sabotaged the gravel plant at Langen near Frankfurt. With their action, they are actively opposing the ongoing climate destruction by the operator Sehring.
The construction and building industry is responsible for 38% of all global greenhouse gas emissions, particularly from the climate-damaging building material concrete. This makes the gravel mined in Langen, the main component of concrete, the driving force behind a construction industry without moderation and without a social or ecological conscience.
During their action, the activists gained access to the site, cut through the conveyor belts and damaged some of the machines. Lisa Müller explains: “We must counter the ecological and social destruction of the construction industry quickly and effectively where it is happening. For us, this means directly sabotaging profit-oriented production. Because it is not only driving the climate crisis with the dirty building material concrete. By demolishing instead of sarnishing and building luxury apartments, it is also causing displacement and inhumane, concreted-over cities.” In Germany, for example, 200 million tons of construction waste are produced every year during demolition and excavation - that corresponds to half of Germany’s waste volume. At the same time, 517 million tons of raw materials such as lime, gravel and sand are used every year in Germany.
The Sehring company is also poking at an old wound in Frankfurt and the region: as the main supplier for the construction of the new Airport Terminal 3, Sehring is fueling the long-standing conflict over noise protection, air pollution and forest destruction around Frankfurt Airport. Özge Cidem comments: “Sehring has a ‘tradition’ of destruction and has been involved in airport expansion since 1968. Sehring is just as indifferent to local people as it is to nature: 30.2 hectares of forest have been cleared for gravel extraction so far, and almost as much is still to be destroyed. And this while, for example, 98.5% of all trees in Frankfurt’s city forest are diseased.” Research by BUND also shows: Destruction is a red line running through the company’s policy. According to BUND, Sehring is not fulfilling the reforestation requirements and is therefore actively contributing to the loss of the forest and biodiversity.
For us it is clear: we have to do it ourselves. We destroy what destroys us and we build what builds us.
Frankfurt Airport also demonstrates the short-sightedness and misanthropy of the construction industry and the profit-oriented economy: Terminal 3 is to replace the old Terminal 1 in order to continue to serve as a hub for global supply chain overproduction and an important deportation airport. The climate activists emphasize that a radical rethink is needed in the construction industry, the economy and politics. Kim Grünholt says: “Our action is part of the protests against Runway West, the resistance in Lützerath and the struggles of activists around the world for a good life for all. That is why we are resisting the industrial processes and policies that have brought us the misery of ecological and social crisis in the first place. We know that a different way of living together is possible. For us it is clear: we have to do it ourselves. We destroy what destroys us and we build what builds us.”
Local environmental initiatives have been protesting for years against the gravel works that are eating their way through the protected Langener Bannwald forest piece by piece. Find out more on our protest page Forest instead of gravel: Save the Langener Bannwald!
The article was sent to us anonymously with the request for publication.
(Translated with deepl)
At least in the US, this kind of sabotage has had fairly limited impact, for several reasons:
- damages get covered by insurance, so one-off sabotage has little financial impact on the people doing the damage
- press blackout on most of it; you might get in the local press once, and then no more coverage
- any group which is doing this and recruits members is rapidly infiltrated by police informants
- it’s really easy for groups which don’t recruit new members to have their members ID’d through cell phones, license plates, cell-enabled cars, etc.
Do you know of any public reflections / analysis or report backs from groups that were involved?
Not that’s public, no. There are documentaries about a few (eg: the valve turners, Earth Liberation Front)
Events which get more than local press require attacking not just fossil fuel infrastructure, but the lifestyles of the rich and famous. Eg: announcing that you’ve conducted a hard-to-detect sandpaper-and-mercury attack on internal parts of private jets would get press, but going after a gravel pit, pipeline, or coal train won’t. That’s why symbolic attacks on the glass protecting artwork has been effective at creating a discussion of climate.
Actually changing things though this approach would mean having independent cells forming that don’t communicate with each other, but damage the same or similar targets often enough that the insurance industry won’t underwrite that class of asset anymore.
It also needs to be backed by social proof of people wanting climate action. That means things like huge marches to show people that they’re not alone in wanting change.
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Hell yeah lets build more concrete office buildings! Definitely going to brainstorm the solution to climate change in there
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Kinda agree, but more realistically they are selling to the highest bidder without caring for the impact.
Also if they would only sell to windpark builders, they probably wouldnt have to destroy a forest.
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Idk why you think that literally just planting the same amount of trees is somehow the same as leaving a forest as it is. Especially in the climate crisis where we quite literally need every tree and need to preserve every biotope…
Also
According to BUND, Sehring is not fulfilling the reforestation requirements and is therefore actively contributing to the loss of the forest and biodiversity.
And what are they supposed to do?
Fuck off, thats what they are supposed to do imo
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