For Earth Day 2012, the Danish Cultural Institute in collaboration with Earth Day Network embarked on a mission to perform CO2 Green Drive in more than 10 cities on 5 continents utilizing electric vehicles, bicycles, skaters and “runners, walkers and crawlers” as participants were dubbed in India.
The events opened 20th April with two simultaneous CO2 Green Drive events in New York/US and Horsens/Denmark. In Horsens a parade of several hundred bikes and electric vehicles “tagged” the city with a huge CO2 while in New York City, simultaneously, the artist behind CO2 Green Drive, Jacob Fuglsang Mikkelsen, in collaboration with Earth Day New York coordinated a convoy of electric vehicles that “tagged” New York with a huge E sign inspired by Mahatma Gandhi’s famous quote “Be the change you want to see in the world.” The convoy ended on Times Square with a “Car Fashion Show” and exhibition of vehicles and speeches by prominent people, such as, Bob Lutz, former chairman of General Motors and largely responsible for the GM Volt.
See more from New York in this video
The E painting in New York, the bicycle convoy opening in Horsens and the Horsens CO2 “tag”
On the 21st April the events continued with Mohammed Shaik commencing on a 24 hours cycling and running CO2 painting in Bangalore while Aparna Choudhary and Abhijit Yeole joined with a 24 hours effort in Pune. Between the three of them almost 100 km running and 400 km cycling was completed in 24 hours.
22nd April 2012 witnessed the largest amounts of CO2 Green Drive projects ever to take place in one day with events in ten cities on three continents. The events started in Yokohama/Japan where artist and global CO2 Green Drive Project Manager Michael Wolffhechel “tagged” Yokohama with a CO2 sign. India followed up with more CO2 paintings performed by “runners, walkers and crawlers” in New Delhi, Bangalore, Thane, Bhopal, Pune and Hyderabad. All in all, some 250 people in India participated in the Run-Walk-Crawl edition of CO2 Green Drive during Earth Day, from 6 year old Bubbles Shinde to a 76 year old man.
The participants in New Delhi, still from Mohammed Shaik’s 24 hours route in Bangalore and the Back 2 Fitness crew in New Delhi
In Dakar/Senegal CO2 Green Drive was performed in collaboration with City Hall, LEAD Africa, Cykler til Senegal, the peasants organization COLUFIFA, Enda Monde and other local partners. The program included 200 bicyclists and skaters completing a 7.5 km long CO2 shaped route through Dakar that could be followed live on the internet via Smartphone GPS tracking. The events were attended by Secretary General Finn Andersen and Aziz Fall, a native Senegalese living in Denmark and Strategy Advisor for the CO2 Green Drive project. The events were intensively covered on nationwide TV and newspapers.
Before start in Dakar, the parade through Dakar and TV interview before the CO2 convoy opening
Cape Town also witnessed its very own CO2 Green Drive performance in collaboration with our local production network and South Africa based Electric Vehicle producer Optimal Energy that participated with an electric vehicle.
The events for the day came to their finale in Santiago/Chile where CO2 Green Drive was performed by bicyclists.
CO2 og E malerier fra Horsens, New York, Dakar, New Delhi, Yokohama, Cape Town and Santiago
CO2 tegning mangler fra Bangalore, Thane, Bhopal, Pune og Hyderabad.