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Kelly Mitchell’s adrenaline surged as she began her ascent up the 450-foot smoke stack at the Fisk coal-fired power plant in Chicago. Wearing a tight-fitting safety harness and loaded down with industrial climbing gear, Mitchell, along with seven other activists from Greenpeace, scaled the stack at the break of dawn on Tuesday in order to paint “Quit Coal” in bright yellow on the side of the towering structure.

Greenpeace coordinated this action-the most high profile anti-coal protest the group has orchestrated in the United States-to protest both the local problems associated with coal-fired power generation (air pollution that causes sickness and death) and its aggregate contributions to global warming as a leading source of greenhouse gas emissions.

While Greenpeace is demanding that Fisk and the nearby Crawford plant be shut down, it is also sending a message to other parts of the environmental and climate justice movements. In the wake of failed efforts to push Congress to pass comprehensive climate change legislation, many in the movement-not least those perched atop the smoke stack at Fisk-argue it is time for more radical tactics.

Halfway up the stack, Mitchell took phone calls from the media and explained her participation: “We need bold action. Air pollution and climate change are urgent problems that are not being addressed by our leaders, whether they are in government or business. I hope this action can bring attention to that need for urgency.”