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If approved by the Obama Administration, the Keystone XL pipeline will lock the United States into a dependence on hard-to-extract oil and generate a massive expansion of the destructive tar sands oil operations in Canada. Beyond Oil • The Sierra Club and our allies ramped up our grassroots, media, and advocacy pressure to protect the pristine Arctic Ocean from dangerous oil drilling. Our spotlight on Shell Oil preceded the announcement that they would not drill in the Arctic in 2013, and we will continue this pressure to make this victory permanent and keep the Arctic off-limits to exploration and drilling. • At the Forward on Climate rally in February, the Sierra Club and our supporters took to the streets, hosting the largest climate rally in U.S. history. Over 50,000 protesters opposing the Keystone XL pipeline assembled and demonstrated at the Washington Monument and at satellite rallies in more than 34 cities, coast-to-coast. Beyond Natural Gas • In Colorado, where the Governor teamed up with the oil and gas industry to sue local communities that ban the use of fracking, the Sierra Club stepped in to defend the rights of these communities to determine where oil and gas drilling can take place within city borders. A wild bear in the wilderness in Alaska. • A federal judge ruled that the Bureau of Land Management violated the law by leasing more than 17,000 additional acres of land in California without considering the impact of fracking to the environment. This was the first court opinion to find a federal lease invalid for failing to address environmental issues caused by fracking. Our Wild America • Our Wild America campaign kicked off the first half of the year with a major success for our new monument strategy program that paid off with the designation of the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument in Northern New Mexico which sets the stage for additional designations in the future. International Impact Beyond Our Borders • In his climate plan, President Obama called for an end to public funding of international coal plants. The World Bank subsequently adopted similar policies, which was a huge success after Sierra Club led the charge to call for an end to coal lending at the World Bank.