Infamous climate change denier sees the light
In a shift that shocked many in the climate movement yesterday, infamous climate change denier Bjorn Lomborg, author of the book The Skeptical Environmentalist, has stated that he believes at least $100 billion a year should be spent to fight man-made climate change.
British newspaper The Guardian reports that in a new book to be released next month, Lomborg says that anthropogenic global warming is “undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today” and “a challenge humanity must confront.”
In his new book, Lomborg presents eight methods to stop climate change, including pouring money into researching and developing clean energy sources such as wind, wave, solar and nuclear power, and more work on climate engineering ideas such as “cloud whitening” to reflect the sun’s heat back into the outer atmosphere.
In a year when the world continues to be pummeled by outrageous extreme weather events due to climate change, Lomborg’s stunning flip flop can only further bolster the climate movement’s position. Let’s hope he truly believes what he’s saying– not just trying to sell more books. Then again, if supporting climate action does help him sell books, who knows which prominent denier will be next to join the good guys. Perhaps one of our favorite former Alaskan politicians, Sarah Palin and Lisa Murkowski? Stranger things have happened.
Read the original Guardian article here. Continue reading
Step right up to the CarnivOIL!
Yesterday I joined with friends from Environment Virginia at Monroe Park next to Virginia Commonwealth University to celebrate CarnivOIL, a traveling carnival for the oil industry where everything’s free (because the oil industry never has to pay!) The tongue-in-cheek event highlights the cozy relationship between the oil industry and Congress- particularly the Senate that has failed to act on climate change. The lively event attracted many VCU students who stopped to play games like “Tar the Goldfish” where you tossed tar balls into fish habitats and the “Spill-O-Rama” which measured how strong you are by how much oil you can get away with spilling. In the boxing ring, a crab battled an oil executive. A fair fight, until the referee made the crab remove his gloves so the oil exec could clobber him. A great, fun event but it highlights a sad reality. Luckily, CarnivOIL-goers know it’s time to put a stop to the fun and games and get serious. At CarnivOIL, they signed a petition calling on Senator Warner to take action and pledge to take action themselves by signing the Power Vote pledge.
More pictures after the jump. Continue reading
Social Networks
Find us on your favorite social networks!
A little laugh for your Wednesday afternoon
As 60,000 barrels of oil or more spilled into the Gulf of Mexico a day, the U.S. Senate voted to preserve subsidies to the oil industry. As the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency announced the planet has just come through the warmest decade, the warmest year, and the warmest April, May, and June on record, the Senate utterly failed to pass any energy, climate change, or even oil spill response legislation. As devastating floods sweep Pakistan and Russia wakes up to deep yellow skies, uncontrollable wildfires, and a chocking heat wave, the U.S. Senators continue to bury their heads in the sand and ignore the problem: we are addicted to fossil fuels and its killing us AND the earth.
Needless to say, all of us in the climate movement are a bit exasperated right now. I think we need a good laugh, especially if it comes at the expense of the group at the root of many of our current woes.
Enter Oil Change International’s newest campaign website: CleanUpTheSenate.com. Continue reading
Mad As Hell and Doing Something About It
Last week, a couple of days after Harry Reid announced that there would be no floor debate and no vote until at least September on ANY legislation having to do with the BP blowout disaster, energy policy or climate change, I was part of a group of people that went up to Capitol Hill and presented “oily hands awards” to staff people for Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana. This action was initiated and organized by the 1Sky coalition.
Unexpectedly, our group of 10 people got into a polite but pointed and direct back-and-forth with one of Lisa Murkowski’s top aides, Chuck Cleeschulte, before we gave him a big foam hand covered in brown paint, the “oily hand.”
Continue reading
Anti-Corporate Activism is Climate Activism
Fossil fuel money is irreparably corrupting our politics, and to win on climate change, climate activists have to start caring as much about the pollution of our political system, as they care about the pollution of our skies. That’s why I spoke in Baltimore this past week at a MoveOn rally for Continue reading
Blue Virginia: Offshore Oil Drilling Poses "unacceptable risk to naval forces in Hampton Roads"
This is a cross post from Blue Virginia.
I just got off a conference call on the dangers of offshore oil drilling in Virginia and lessons learned from the Gulf of Mexico disaster. Speakers included Chesapeake Climate Action Network Executive Director Mike Tidwell, Virginia Sierra Club Assistant Director J.R. Tolbert, and retired Navy captain/former Delegate Joe Bouchard. I’ll get to Tolbert’s and Tidwell’s comments in a minute, but first I want to highlight what Joe Bouchard had to say, because it was very strong.
First, according to Bouchard, there’s a long record of offshore oil and gas activities interfering with Defense Department training ranges. The industry likes to claim that they have a “great working relationship with the military,” but “you can’t believe that for a minute.” In fact, Bouchard says, “interference with training ranges is well documented,” and claims to the contrary by the oil industry are “disingenuous if not outright untrue.” Continue reading
An open letter to all people and organizations working to combat global warming
Crosspost from Grist.org
This letter is from members of the 1Sky board of directors: Jessica Bailey, K.C. Golden, Bracken Hendricks, Bill McKibben, Billy Parish, Vicky Rateau, Gus Speth, and Betsy Taylor.
As we find ourselves surrounded by the tatters of the climate debate in the U.S. Congress, it seems fitting to take a moment to step back and ponder where we go from here. While the blogosphere is buzzing with assignments of blame for the failure of the Senate to act, we are much more concerned about how we move forward with urgency and clarity of purpose. Unfortunately, we do not have the luxury to pack our bags and go home as the Senate did only moments ago. We just staggered through the hottest six months in recorded history worldwide. People everywhere are being impacted by the damage we have done through decades of carbon loading, and it is clear that our ailing planet will not sit idly by as our political leaders have done. Continue reading
"Don't Let Up, Fight Harder"
Judy Bonds may not be physically present when thousands of people take action September 27th in Washington, D.C. to demand an end to mountaintop removal and strip mining, and that would be a real shame. If there is one person who has done more in their life to shake up the coal barons and, in her words, “put them on the ropes,” it’s Judy Bonds, co-director of Coal River Mountain Watch.
Judy may not be there because she learned last month that she has stage three cancer. Treatment will take at least three months.
There’s no question, however, that Judy will be there in spirit, and that her spirit is guiding the growing Appalachia Rising coalition (http://www.appalachiarising.org). This coalition is organizing a two-day “Voices of the Mountains” conference the weekend of September 25-26 followed by a mass demonstration on Monday the 27th.
Continue reading