Local activists who participated in a June protest against trains carrying crude oil say Maine and the nation must stop using fossil fuels, especially in the wake of the Lac Megantic disaster.

“It strengthens our resolve to fight this even more,” said Elizabeth Catlin, a Brunswick native and one of six activists arrested June 27 in Fairfield for attempting to block a train carrying oil.

The Fairfield protest was organized by 350 Maine, a grassroots organization with members across the state who work to prevent climate disruption from fossil fuels. The Brunswick area has members but “no local focus of activity,” according to Heidi Brugger, a spokeswoman.

Activists such as Catlin say the Fairfield protest validated their efforts in light of the subsequent disaster July 5 at Lac Megantic.

“The scope of the disaster is beyond anything we could have imagined,” Catlin said. “What happened in Lac Megantic could happen in any city, town or village that the railroads travel through.”

Scrutiny of oil shipments through Maine had been increasing as activists alleged a proposal to reverse the flow of an existing pipeline to bring tar sands oil past Sebago Lake, the Androscoggin River and other places throughout Maine.

After a train bound for Maine exploded in Lac Megantic, Quebec, on July 5, destroying a village and killing scores of people, that scrutiny only grew.

In the wake of the disaster, Maine transportation officials have promised greater scrutiny of track conditions and the Maine, Montreal & Atlantic Rail Co., which operates the lines through Lac Megantic and also throughout Maine.

Nearly 5.3 million barrels passed through the state by rail last year, and officials say that volume is only expected to increase. About 30,000 barrels of crude oil a day were shipped through Maine by rail in March; that figure was about 2,000 barrels at the beginning of the year.

Catlin, who graduated early from Brunswick High School in 2007, spent most of the past year in Texas and Oklahoma, organizing against another controversial oil transit proposal — the Keystone XL pipeline, which would bring tar sands oil from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

She came to the Fairfield protest because she saw an opportunity “to be in Maine where I grew up and where my family is, and to protect the state and the people who live there from extreme extraction.”

Heidi Vierthaler, of Freeport, also attended the Fairfield protest as “part of the support team that was letting the passers-by know” about those being arrested.

“We wanted to spare the neighborhood of Fairfield from the same kinds of oil spills that were occurring along the tracks, tar sands spills in Mayflower (Ark.), and Kalamazoo (Mich.) which have not been able to be cleaned up,” Vierthaler said. “And we don’t want them to have to do that in Maine.”

Vierthaler traces her activism from helping keep a toxic waste chemical treatment plant from being sited upstream from where she was living in New York in the early 1980s.

“I didn’t work so hard to keep that region pristine, then only to have it poisoned with fracking now,” she said, referring to a controversial oil extraction process that involves fracturing rock with high pressure water and chemicals to release hard-tofind oil.

“When I heard it was fracked oil (carried by the train in Fairfield), I thought this was really important. I need to get out there,” said Vierthaler.

Regis Tremblay, of Woolwich, filmed the protest.

He said “by and large,” people in the Brunswick area do not seem to be aware of issues like fracking and oil spills.

“Whether it’s willful ignorance or total apathy or not paying attention, I have no idea,” he said, “but it’s a very serious problem.”

Jamie Py of the Brunswickbased Maine Energy Marketers Association expressed sympathy in the aftermath of the Lac Megantic disaster.

“Unfortunately, there will be times when accidents will occur,” he said, adding here are other materials coming through Maine by rail “that are much more hazardous than crude oil.”

“If you want to prevent any accidents at any time,” Py said, “then we should just shut down transportation completely.”

“Energy is critical to society,” he said. “Probably pipelines are the best way (to transport oil), but there’s nothing really wrong with rail as long as all the precautions are being kept.”

Catlin said the railroad to transport heavy crude oil does not run through Brunswick but it does run through the Auburn and Lewiston area, and any spill along the Androscoggin River would have an impact on Brunswick and other towns downriver.

“Our long range goal is the elimination of oil,” she said — a claim Py seized on as exemplifying an extreme agenda.

“It is absolutely necessary to move beyond fossil fuel if we are to have a livable future,” Catlin said. “We’ve moved from one energy source to another before in Maine. We had a hydro economy that powered our mills for over a hundred years. It certainly is the reason Brunswick is a major Maine city. Oil replaced water and has been supreme for less than a hundred years. It’s time to replace it.”

Catlin said she plans to keep organizing around many issues and plans to come back to Maine in the next few years.

“I think fighting to stop these trains that risk such destruction to water sources and communities in the state marks a major current chapter in this history of Maine resistance against really destructive and careless corporate practices.”

MORGANA WARNER-EVANS is a Times Record intern.

¦ 350 MAINE was founded in February 2012 by Bob Klotz of South Portland, Read Brugger of Freedom and Heidi Brugger of Freedom.

First statewide meeting: October 2012, Unity College, Unity

Second statewide meeting: April 2013, Durham

Existing “nodes” in Waldo County, Androscoggin County, Central Maine, Bangor, Greater Portland. Other areas such as Brunswick and York have some members but no local focus of activity.

For more information, visit www.350maine.org/about

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