East Quogue Woman To Fight Climate Change At United Nations Conference

Dineen O’Rourke of East Quogue has spent most of her college career fighting a proposed $3 billion pipeline, one that would have stretched from New Hampshire to Pennsylvania and, according to her, would have further accelerated the ill effects of climate change.When she enrolled at Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 2013, she was immediately drawn to fighting the project proposed by Kinder Morgan, one of the largest energy infrastructure companies in North America. She helped organize community events where demonstrators would sing songs, as well as a four-day, 53-mile march along the expected path of the natural gas pipeline that would have run through Massachusetts.

After two and a half years of battles, Kinder Morgan withdrew its application for the 250-mile pipeline this past April after it failed to sign up enough utility customers, according to the company.

“That was the most hopeful thing that I ever became a part of, that I was part of that news that the pipeline was over,” said Ms. O’Rourke, 21, who is majoring in both climate change and sociology. “It really solidified the fact that people coming together can make a big difference, especially in the face of impending climate change.”

Ms. O’Rourke’s opposition to the pipeline helped the Westhampton Beach High School graduate secure a spot as one of 13 American youth delegates who will meet with the United Nations next week. On behalf of the youth empowerment and advocacy nonprofit SustainUS, the students will travel to Marrakesh, Morocco, for a U.N. climate change conference that runs from November 7 to 18.

“I’m really excited to go back to Morocco, because it’s a really beautiful country,” said Ms. O’Rourke, explaining that she studied abroad there last year. “I have these connections from students I met there already. To see them in this exciting space, the U.N. negotiations—it’s a big deal when a country gets to host these.”

To apply to become one of the youth delegates, Ms. O’Rourke had to get a work of writing published. She wrote about the defeated pipeline for Powershift, a blog for student voices found at powershift.org/blogs. Her story, titled “Why I’m (Mindfully) Celebrating The Suspension Of The Kinder Morgan Pipeline,” explains that although getting the company to pull out of the project was a big win, her fight is far from over.

“We will rest only when the fossil fuel industry is brought to a halt and when the U.N. mandates a target of net zero emissions by 2050,” she wrote.

The continuing goal, she explained, is to phase out carbon emissions and the burning of fossil fuels. Several studies recently published by different organizations have suggested that if the burning of fossil fuels is not phased out in less than 35 years, humans will no longer be able to mitigate climate change, according to Ms. O’Rourke.

“We are going to be pushing for zero by 2050,” she said during a recent interview at Tiana Beach on Dune Road in Hampton Bays. “And as young people from the U.S., we play this really unique role where we are really a front-line community … because we didn’t do anything to cause this problem, but it is us who are going to have to deal with it.

“But we are also from the U.S.—the country that primarily has caused most of this issue,” she continued. “A lot of what we will be doing is meeting with the U.S. State Department and holding them accountable and calling them out and trying to enforce some true reparations that the U.S. and other developed countries can pay for.”

Zero by 2050 is an especially important movement to Ms. O’Rourke as she grew up in East Quogue, where her home was only seven feet above sea level. It is an even bigger issue for other homeowners in her hometown. She pointed to the line of homes on Dune Road, explaining that fossil fuels need to be limited to prevent the sea level from rising and wiping out all of those houses.

“That’s a mind-boggling fact,” Ms. O’Rourke said. “I think that a lot of what I do, and what I care about, involves communicating that emergency to people. This isn’t a far-away problem anymore. It’s going to define our generation and the world that we live in.”

When Ms. O’Rourke was in high school, she was involved with environmental issues and advocacy concerning climate change, Westhampton Beach Superintendent of Schools Michael Radday recalled in an email this week. He said Ms. O’Rourke was always a strong student and had a knack for environmental and marine sciences.

At school, she could often be found conducting experiments in the science lab—nearly as often as some of her peers could be found on an athletic field—or holding a leadership role in the environmental club Classmates Uniting in Restoring the Environment, or CURE for short.

Back in Ms. O’Rourke’s hometown, local coastal engineers, including Aram Terchunian of First Coastal Corporation in Westhampton Beach, have been researching ways to implement the zero by 2050 plan that she is advocating.

“Cleaner is always better,” Mr. Terchunian said. “Technological improvements [are] what gets us out of the fossil fuel box.”

Mr. Terchunian explained that based on his research he thinks that lithium ion batteries will be able to wean people off fossil fuels by 2025. The batteries, he said, could back-up solar and wind energy suppliers on days when there isn’t enough sun or wind to keep the power on. He added that the batteries will eventually be common in cars as well.

When Ms. O’Rourke graduates this May, she wants to work for an organization that’s fighting climate change, or become a teacher to inspire youth to speak up for what they believe in. Regardless of her future profession, she said her passion will never waver, and that is working with her neighbors to fight those projects that could pollute the environment.