Dear CCANers,
You may have noticed solar panels popping up in tons of places these days: on a neighbor’s roof, on a street-corner utility poll, on a farm field near you. The price of solar keeps falling, moving us closer to the community-based, resilient, distributed, and sustainable energy grid we all know we need to solve climate change.
And here’s what’s also popping up everywhere you turn: grassroots energy leaders. Wherever you look in our region, there are real-life, community-based, common-sense leaders taking on local fights against extreme fossil fuels. Whether it’s fighting for a fracking ban across Maryland or to stop proposed fracked-gas pipelines in Virginia; whether it’s stopping coal-ash dumping in the Potomac River south of DC or stopping explosive crude oil trains from rolling through Baltimore – these leaders are emerging everywhere, at the same time.
People power, like solar power, is spreading in our region – and the two are related. These citizens are part of the place-based and resilient leadership we’ll need to continue our fight to keep fossil fuels in the ground as we make the final switch to “energy democracy” based largely on distributed energy that is local and clean and abundant.
Who are these new leaders? They are people like 86-year-old George Jones, a Korean War veteran whose land in Giles County, Virginia, is being confiscated for a massive proposed fracked-gas pipeline called the Mountain Valley Pipeline. George is fighting back. Though wheelchair bound due to a recent stroke, he inspired Virginians statewide when he rolled nearly a mile through summer heat with 600 other people as part of the “March on the Mansion” demonstration July 23rd. The march ended at Governor Terry McAuliffe’s (D) house with a clear message: drop your support of fracked-gas pipelines in Virginia.
They are people like Vinny and Jamie DeMarco, a father and son duo who biked 370 miles across Maryland in August in support of state legislation to boldly expand wind and solar energy in the state. Governor Larry Hogan (R) recklessly vetoed this popular bill in May. The DeMarcos are encouraging the Maryland General Assembly to override the veto. So the cyclists organized the “Ride for the Override” that spawned inspiring news stories in the Washington Post and across the state. Thanks to this people-powered support from the DeMarcos and others, it looks like the General Assembly will give final approval to the law in January.
Who else are these new leaders? They are people like DC student (and former beloved CCAN staffer) Jon Kenney, who has been fighting to protect urban neighborhoods across our region from a rise in crude-oil rail tankers from North Dakota that now roll through our communities. These increasingly frequent oil trains are a threat not just to our climate, but to households and children due to potential derailments and explosions.
Like budding solar panels, these leaders are popping up everywhere – the mountains of western Maryland, the suburbs of Virginia Beach, the row houses of Washington, DC. This people-based grid of interconnected leaders and communities is widely distributed, spreading fast, and impossible to defeat because the roots are just too wide, too deep.
Of course the major polluters in our region – like Dominion Power – continue to push for energy that is based on the concentrated power of coal and gas plants. The polluters’ political power is equally concentrated, residing in the hands of a few executives who, with big political campaign contributions, influence politicians at the top, who then force dirty energy policies on the rest of us.
But now comes the unstoppable force of Virginians like George Jones and Marylanders like the DeMarcos. I think it’s fair to say the polluters have finally met their match, and we know who’s going to win. Stay tuned and stay active. To change everything, we need everybody. That means me. That means you.
On we go,
Mike Tidwell
