As many as 3000 protesters were expected to participate in the blockade of Newcastle Harbour at the weekend, with estimates of around 1500 taking to the water in kayaks and rafts on Saturday morning to begin a 30-hour stand-off.
The mass action was orchestrated by Rising Tide, a climate change advocacy organisation that former teacher Shaun Murray resurrected in August 2022 to demand that "Australia honours our commitment to the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement".
The group applied to legally stage the weekend's protest before activists began camping out near Nobbys Beach on Friday.
Mr Murray spoke to the crowd on Saturday, citing recent data, and said the ongoing climate crisis had "dire implications" not only for future generations but for the living population on the planet.
"The climate that we know that supports life on this wonderful planet is unravelling," he said.
"The reality of the situation is so dire that, in order to act with the courage and urgency that this moment in history demands, we have to look at that squarely in the eye and do something about it.
"It is the greed and the power of the fossil fuel industry that is bringing us here."
Earlier this week, Rising Tide stated its demands ahead of the protest, calling for a "halt of new fossil fuel projects, and the introduction of a 75 per cent federal tax on fossil fuel export profits to pay for community and industrial transition, and climate loss and damage overseas".
Coal miner Grant Howard, who at one time worked in the Hunter Valley during his 43-year career in the resources industry, said the need for a just transition away from extractive fossil fuels toward renewable energy sources was crucial to the demands of the climate movement.
"I fully understand the need to change, and being a coal miner doesn't divorce me from the issue of caring for our environment," he said.
"It doesn't mean that I can be reckless with our children's future and that's why I'm here today with these guys to raise awareness about the future."
Mr Howard said he got involved in the climate movement after becoming frustrated with the government's response to mitigate the impact of the transition on energy sector workers.
"I got involved in this because I realised that politicians were simply lying, and that annoyed me," he said.
"I simply want politicians to be honest with mine workers. That's the best thing to happen so they can plan their lives."
Niamh Cush, a 15-year-old student, said she was "terrified" by the prospect of climate catastrophe and fearful of the future.
"The government needs to stop funding new coal and gas projects, and they need to start funding the transition plan to renewable energy. They've been told this since before I was born," she said.
"I'm angry that over and over again, they continue to ignore and belittle the loud and angry voices of youth in this country.
"This should not be a discussion any more."
As the boats launched into the harbour, University of Newcastle climate researcher Liam Phelan, whose work focuses on the impact of climate change on insurance, described climate change as a "wicked problem" where, because of the scope and scale of the issue, a unified definition of the problem was often unclear. So, a single solution was also difficult to articulate.
"Wicked problems are characterised by a few things," Dr Phelan said.
"Typically, they're high stakes, there's a lot of money involved, time is really short and, typically, there's not good agreement around the definition of the problem.
"Climate change is a really good example. One way to describe the problem of climate change is that there's too much CO2 in the atmosphere, especially in the ocean - that is a true statement.
"But we could also say the problem with climate change is the accelerating burning of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution. That's also true.
"And then other folks might say, it's really about colonialism and an extractive mentality, a controlling mentality that comes with colonial understanding; thinking of this planet as being for us to use however we want ... Other folks might say it's capitalism."
The wickedness of the problem, Dr Phelan said, was that with various definitions of the issue came equally varied solutions, which were, in some respects, resistant to change. But, he likened the weekend's action to the civil disobedience movements of the past and said direct action was how change would be achieved.
"This is what social change looks like," he said.
"People think it's expected that women have the right to vote, but [the suffrage movement] started not that long ago, and the way that women got the vote wasn't simply through changes to policy and making the arguments and pleading. It was about actually getting out there, being thrown in jail, and doing civil disobedience. It was the right thing to do, and it was an important thing to do.
"We are at a similar moment here. The scale is similar; it's global ... There is no future for humans on this planet with us continuing to export coal from here."
