More than 30 actions and events this week directly confronted the corporate profiteers bankrolling the Keystone XL pipeline and the broader tar sands industry. These actions come at a critical time as investor confidence in Alberta’s tar sands is waning due to major delays and resistance to Keystone XL’s construction timeline.

The Keystone XL project has become a flagship issue for the U.S. climate movement and has spurred dozens of acts of civil disobedience and the largest climate rally in U.S. history. But while 45,000 marched on the White House, President Obama was golfing with oil executives and the southern segment of KXL in Texas and Oklahoma was still being built.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that we cannot rely on corporation-funded politicians to oppose corporate excess; we must engage this destructive industry directly. That’s what we’ve done in Texas, and it’s working: in February, TransCanada reported lower fourth-quarter earnings and admitted that the southern portion of Keystone XL (the Gulf Coast Project) was way behind schedule and only 45 percent completed.

By showing up at their offices and putting a stop to “business as usual,” we can show tar sands investors that their lives would be easier and their businesses more secure if they invested in projects that don’t endanger our communities’ health and the chance for a livable climate.

This week, grassroots activists from more than 50 organizations nationwide are uniting to send a strong message to the industry that TransCanada and its financial backers must rethink their investments in tar sands, the dirtiest fuel on the planet. We have demonstrated to companies bankrolling KXL that their investments are as toxic as the tar sands they want to pump through the pipeline. Activists are marching, holding rallies, giving trainings, and physically disrupting business for those who seek to profit from the exploitation of marginalized people and the destruction of our collective future.

Some of the top tar sands profiteers facing protest this week: TD Bank, Valero Corp, CIBC World Market, and Tortoise Investment Management, to name a few.

The March 16-23 Week of Action to Stop Tar Sands Profiteers, in solidarity with Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance's Direct Action Camp in Ponca City, Oklahoma, seeks to expose green-washed corporations like TD Bank, a top shareholder in TransCanada, and force them to divest from the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.

“Its encouraging to see people around the country taking action to stop tar sands profiteers,” said Ron Seifert, spokesperson for Tar Sands Blockade. “No longer will we allow them to build KXL and invest in toxic projects that endanger the health of low-income and communities of color. We will not allow 'business as usual' to continue.”

Here are a few highlights from the Week of Action so far:

• 100 people occupied a TransCanada office in Westborough, Mass., holding a "Funeral for Our Future" and disrupting work for several hours. Twenty-five were arrested for locking themselves inside the office.

• TD Bank branches have seen protests at multiple locations, including three people who were arrested for locking themselves inside a branch office in Washington, D.C.

• Twelve people were arrested for blockading a fracking pipeline in upstate New York.

• Portland, Oregon held a bike tour of the city’s worst polluters including a rally at a TransCanada office.

Dozens of activists in Grim Reaper garb surround the Michaels Corporate office in Kirkland, Wash., demanding that Michaels stop building Keystone XL.

Check Tar Sands Blockade for live updates and to learn how to get involved in actions around the country, which are continuing through March 23.