andy jassy
'Troublemakers' Block Amazon HQ Over Plan to Link Data Centers With Gas Pipeline
"Amazon is breaking its Climate Pledge by powering new data centers with fracked gas," said one member of the new activist group. "So we came to demand that they honor the pledge."
A recently formed group of climate activists on Wednesday shut down entrances to Amazon's downtown Seattle headquarters to protest the tech titan's plans to link some of its data centers with an upgraded fracked gas pipeline.
Members of the Troublemakers—who describe themselves as "an ever-growing community of people who are committed to taking action for life on Earth"—blockaded the doors to the Day 1 Building on 7th Ave. in opposition to Amazon Web Services' (AWS) plan to connect three data centers near Boardman, Oregon to TC Energy's Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) XPress Project.
As Common Dreamsreported last October, GTN XPress, which has been approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, would upgrade compressor stations in Kootenai County, Idaho; Sherman County, Oregon; and Walla Walla County, Washington. TC Energy plans to boost the 60-year-old pipeline's capacity by 150 million cubic feet of fracked gas by increasing the conduit's pressure.
"The decision to use fracked gas from the GTN XPress adds to Amazon's carbon emissions problems," the Troublemakers said in a statement. "Amazon's 2022 carbon emissions totaled 71.27 million metric tons, marking an 18% rise from 2020 and a 40% surge since 2019, the year Amazon unveiled its Climate Pledge. This alarming trend is in stark contrast to the global imperative to halve emissions by 2030."
The group wrote in a March 19 letter to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy:
Amazon prides itself on innovation. Using fossil fuel is not innovation... It is relying on a dying technology that is killing the planet. Utilizing GTN XPress would increase Amazon's carbon footprint and contribute greatly to climate change... We urge you to publicly commit to financing solar or wind projects to provide clean energy for Amazon's operations, and reject the GTN XPress.
The Troublemakers are calling on Amazon to:
- Publicly renounce the plan to connect to GTN XPress;
- Commit to not powering AWS data centers with fossil fuels; and
- Commit to using 100% renewable energy in each operation while funding wind and solar generation, storage, and distribution.
"We see Amazon's greenwashing every time we pass by Climate Pledge Arena," said Troublemaker Valerie Costa, who was referring to the home of the Seattle Kraken and Seattle Storm professional sports franchises. "Until Amazon drops its plan to buy fracked gas from GTN XPress, we'll keep showing up. Every fossil fuel project in the [Pacific Northwest] will be met with fierce resistance."
Leonard Sklar, a scientist and Troublemaker, asserted that "Amazon is breaking its Climate Pledge by powering new data centers with fracked gas. So we came to demand that they honor the pledge."
"We know they have the power to be 100% renewable energy," he added, "and that's what this moment requires."
Amazon, Alphabet Workers Protest Companies' Complicity in Israeli Apartheid
"As an Amazon employee, I do not want my work to support apartheid and war crimes," said one protesting worker.
Under the rallying cry of #NoTechForApartheid, a group of Amazon and Alphabet workers rallied Wednesday with allied activists outside the tech titan's annual Amazon Web Services Summit today to demand that the company and Google cancel a billion-dollar cloud computing services contract with Israel's government and military.
The employees of Amazon and Alphabet—Google's parent company—protested Project Nimbus, through which the two tech giants sell cloud services to the Israel Defense Forces, enabling the Israeli government's surveillance and oppression of Palestinians. The project also provides data support to the Israel Land Authority, which, according to Human Rights Watch, uses discriminatory policies to expand illegal Jewish-only settler colonies on stolen Palestinian land.
Among the demonstrators standing with Amazon and Google workers were activists from MPower Change, Jewish Voice for Peace, Adalah Justice Project, Fight for the Future, and the Athena Coalition.
Project Nimbus has been the target of previous protests by Amazon and Alphabet workers, shareholders, and other activists.
"As an Amazon employee, I do not want my work to support apartheid and war crimes," software engineer Alestin Sphere said in a statement. "This contract will directly accelerate the expansion of surveillance tech, the weaponization of AI, and the proliferation of cyber weapons."
"As an employee, it's my responsibility to speak out against it, and as a Palestinian, it is my duty," Sphere contended. "Allowing this contract to be implemented without protest would be a major disservice to the world."
Laith Abad, another Amazon engineer, said that "today I'm joining my co-workers as both a first-generation Palestinian American and Amazon engineer to ensure that the tech we build and sell doesn't harm our own communities and those of our users through contracts like Project Nimbus."
"Through this contract, Amazon and Google enable the same kind of violence that the Israeli government and military inflict on many Palestinians, similar to the violence my own father and family experienced as they were ethnically cleansed from their homes," he continued.
"Amazon cannot continue justifying this contract," Abad added. "As an Amazon worker, I want a real say in my labor. I don't want my labor to be used to inflict the same violence and suffering that my family has faced on anyone else."
The employees noted that the protest "also takes place during the 75th anniversary of the Nakba, or the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war" when more than 700,000 Arabs were ethnically cleansed from their homeland—sometimes by massacres—to make way for the establishment of the modern state of Israel.
Dani Noble, campaigns organizer at Jewish Voice for Peace, said that "leading human rights organizations have confirmed what Palestinians have been saying for decades: that Israel is an apartheid state based on Jewish supremacy, where Israeli Jews have more rights and freedoms than Palestinians."
"Amazon technology can all too easily be used by the Israeli government to entrench its apartheid system: expand Jewish-only settlements, force Palestinian families off of their land, and destroy their homes," Noble noted. "Amazon tech workers are bravely saying no more—they want their labor to help people, not enable violence against Palestinians. As Jews organizing for Palestinian freedom, we are proud to show up in solidarity with tech workers standing up for Palestinian rights."
Lau Barrios, senior campaign manager at MPower Change, a grassroots movement led by U.S. Muslims, said that Amazon "profits from surveillance, land grabs, and deadly violence against the Palestinian people."
"For almost two years, Amazon's own tech workers have been clear: They don't want their labor to enable this suffering," she asserted. "Tech companies are the new war profiteers: Amazon CEO Andy Jassy was head of AWS in May 2021 when he approved the contract and while the Israeli military systematically bombed Palestinian homes, hospitals, and schools in Gaza."
"Jassy can still choose to put people over profit, listen to his own workers, and cut ties with Israel's brutal military occupation," Barrios added. "It's our duty to show up with workers today to say No Tech For Apartheid together."
Sanders Launches Senate Probe Into Amazon's 'Dangerous and Illegal' Working Conditions
"There is only one explanation for Amazon's repeated failure to protect its warehouse workers: unacceptable corporate greed," Sen. Bernie Sanders wrote to the company's CEO.
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday launched an investigation into the notoriously dangerous working conditions at Amazon's U.S. warehouses, writing in a letter to CEO Andy Jassy that the company's "quest for profits at all costs" has put the health and safety of tens of thousands of workers at risk.
"Amazon is well aware of these dangerous conditions, the life-altering consequences for workers injured on the job, and the steps the company could take to reduce the significant risks of injury," wrote Sanders (I-Vt.), the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. "Yet the company has made a calculated decision not to implement adequate worker protections because Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder, and you, his successor as Chief Executive Officer, have created a corporate culture that treats workers as disposable."
"At every turn—from warehouse design and workstation setup, to pace of work requirements, to medical care for injuries and subsequent pressure to return to work—Amazon makes decisions that actively harm workers in the name of its bottom line," the senator continued, taking the company to task for "pushing workers past their limits" and refusing to provide adequate medical care when they are injured.
\u201cToday, I launched an investigation into Amazon's disastrous safety record. Amazon is one of the most valuable companies in the world owned by Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world. Amazon should be the safest place in America to work, not one of the most dangerous.\u201d— Bernie Sanders (@Bernie Sanders) 1687276078
Sanders' probe comes weeks after a report by the Strategic Organizing Center found that Amazon warehouse workers—who are closely surveilled and held to grueling performance targets—suffered serious injuries on the job at more than twice the rate as employees at non-Amazon facilities last year, a safety risk that has helped fuel unionization efforts at the company.
The e-commerce giant has also faced growing scrutiny from federal regulators. Earlier this year, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited several Amazon warehouses for "failing to keep workers safe" and "exposing workers to ergonomic hazards."
In his Tuesday letter, Sanders called Amazon's warehouse conditions "dangerous and illegal" and demanded that Jassy "explain why Amazon's injury rates continue to be significantly higher than the warehouse industry average despite identification of those measures."
The senator also requested that Jassy disclose whether the company has "ever examined, internally or through a third party, the connection between the pace of work of its warehouse workers and the prevalence or cost of injuries at its warehouses."
"If Amazon can afford to spend $6 billion on stock buybacks last year, it can afford to make sure that its warehouses are safe places to work," the senator wrote. "If Amazon can afford to pay you $289 million in total compensation over the past two years, it can afford to treat all of its workers with dignity and respect, not contempt. The time has come for Amazon to stop willfully violating workplace safety laws with impunity and commit to changing its operations to protect the health and safety of its workers."
On Twitter, Sanders called on any current or former Amazon workers with experience in the company's warehouses to share their stories and "help inform the investigation."
"For tens of thousands of workers, the cost of just a few years at an Amazon warehouse is a lifetime of pain," Sanders wrote in his letter to Jassy. "My staff and I have heard concerning stories from workers around the country about the toll that working at Amazon warehouses takes on their bodies."
"Mr. Jassy," Sanders added, "there is only one explanation for Amazon's repeated failure to protect its warehouse workers: unacceptable corporate greed."