Back in June 2013, Katie, Lexy, Claire, Simon, Sarah, Alana, and Josh went to İstanbul to take part in the Global Power Shift, which brought people from 135 countries together to plan, strategise and get active in building a global climate movement.

They returned home with a plan to have a summer full of actions targeting the fossil fuel industry during the Australian summer, called ‘Summer Heat’. They were inspired by the campaign of the same name in the US and by the existing work of communities all around Australia.

Since June, Australia has had a new Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, who is hell-bent on abolishing the price for carbon and replacing it with a claptrap policy called ‘direct action’. Just to provide some context, in a recent survey, 32 out of 35 renowned Australian economists said that the Direct Action policy is both economically and environmentally inferior to the existing carbon price.

Cue in Summer Heat. On December 2, as part of the launch of ‘Summer Heat Australia’, the faces and names of hundreds of community members who have pledged to stand up to the fossil fuel industry were projected onto the side of the Minerals Council of Australia building in Canberra (which recently engulfed the Australian Coal Association).

Summer Heat campaign coordinator Josh Creaser said that the action was designed to tell the industry that even if Tony Abbott refused to take climate change seriously and halt these dangerous plans, the Australian community will. “With the Abbott Government failing to lead on climate change, the community has decided to take real Direct Action. As the temperature rises over Summer, people from communities across Australia will be stepping up campaigns to target the industry and stop their radical plans.”

This isn’t a movement of radical activists. It is mothers and fathers, grandparents, church leaders, lawyers, teachers, nurses and students. This is a community standing up to an industry that is threatening our future.

“Today is just the start.” Creaser said. “We will keep campaigning until these plans are stopped project by project and until this industry realises that they cannot continue to expand if we are to survive.”

And so the power shifts.