CCAN in Copenhagen: Dispatch from the future

First of all, imagine this: the people of Copenhagen, Denmark, generate one-sixth of the greenhouse gas pollution per capita as people living in Washington, D.C. One sixth! That’s the first thing you notice when you come to Copenhagen, as I have, for the international climate talks. I’m here to represent your voice as a dedicated CCAN supporter. I’m also here to see the future.

Denmark as a nation gets nearly 25 percent of its electricity from wind farms. The city of Copenhagen itself is full of bicycles. They’re everywhere. And the subway system is world class. I saw a guy on the subway Sunday in Copenhagen carrying a Christmas tree. On the train. People do everything here, go everywhere, without cars! And Danes, at the same time, are consistently ranked in surveys as some of the happiest people on Earth. Radically low-carbon and happy people.

So I’m seeing the clean-energy future in practice this week. Too bad the world’s top leaders Continue reading

To really save the planet, stop going green

Here’s some food for thought: Like civil rights, we need statutes not gestures. And all domestic statutes and international talks should aim for one unmovable number: 350 ppm carbon in the atmosphere. It’s the only number that matters.

As President Obama heads to Copenhagen next week for global warming talks, there’s one simple step Americans back home can take to help out: Stop “going green.” Just stop it. No more compact fluorescent light bulbs. No more green wedding planning. No more organic toothpicks for holiday hors d’oeuvres.

December should be national Green-Free Month. Instead of continuing our faddish and counterproductive emphasis on small, voluntary actions, we should follow the example of Americans during past moral crises and work toward large-scale change. The country’s last real moral and social revolution was set in motion by the civil rights movement. And in the 1960s, civil rights activists didn’t ask bigoted Southern governors and sheriffs to consider “10 Ways to Go Integrated” at their convenience.

Green gestures we have in abundance in America. Green political action, not so much. And the gestures (“Look honey, another Vanity Fair Green Issue!”) lure us into believing that broad change is happening when the data shows that it isn’t. Despite all our talk about washing clothes in cold water, we aren’t making much of a difference.

For eight years, George W. Bush promoted voluntary action as the nation’s primary response to global warming — and for eight years, aggregate greenhouse gas emissions remained unchanged. Even today, only 10 percent of our household light bulbs are compact fluorescents. Hybrids account for only 2.5 percent of U.S. auto sales. One can almost imagine the big energy companies secretly applauding each time we distract ourselves from the big picture with a hectoring list of “5 Easy Ways to Green Your Office.” Continue reading

Tomorrow is not an option

My Op-Ed below, which previews the Copenhagen climate talks, first ran in the Baltimore Sun and on Grist. As many of you know, I will be attending the climate talks next month from December 13-18 on behalf of CCAN and Earthbeat Radio. I will personally be there to record the voices of passionate, inspiring leaders and to add my own voice to the global chorus demanding faster, better results from our world leaders. Starting December 13th, check out the daily video and audio feeds I’ll be posting to this blog.

Climate change reset needed
Let the EPA crack down on carbon emissions, and switch from ‘cap and trade’ to ‘cap and rebate’

By Mike Tidwell
Baltimore Sun
November 27, 2009

Tomorrow is not an option.

Those ought to be the words coming from the White House right now on global warming. Never again can we tolerate a year like 2009, when attempts to cap carbon pollution go nowhere. Already this month, President Barack Obama has confirmed two painful truths. First: Congress will not complete work on a global warming bill in 2009. And second, the corollary blow: There will be no international climate deal in Denmark next month, dashing years of international hopes.

So Mr. Obama should move quickly from explaining failure to achieving real success. He should travel to the Copenhagen climate conference in December and guarantee drastic action from the U.S. in 2010, even if it means blowing everything up in Congress and starting over. If a “cap and trade” bill won’t fly in the Senate in 2010, then let the Environmental Protection Agency explore maximum-strength carbon regulations while, legislatively, we switch back to Mr. Obama’s original presidential campaign plan: “cap and rebate.”

Apologists, of course, are rushing to defend the president, explaining away the now-official climate failures of 2009. There was never enough time, they say, to fix in a few months all the global warming harm George W. Bush created in eight long years.

Maybe so. But we can’t blame Mr. Bush forever. What’s the plan for 2010? The only strategy the Democrats seem to have is borrowed from 2009: Get the Senate to finally pass the cap and trade bill. That would be the 1,400-page bill narrowly approved by the House in June and loaded with subsidies for “clean coal” and likely big profits for Wall Street traders. It’s been stagnating in the Senate for most of the autumn.

Centrist Democrat Jim Webb of Virginia – a vitally important vote – all but condemned the cap and trade bill last week in a news conference. What if the bill simply never passes? What will Mr. Obama take to the international treaty talks in Germany in June 2010 or in Mexico next December? Continue reading

Rising seas, rising awareness

The Baltimore Sun

By Mike Tidwell

Here’s an idea: Why don’t the residents of Smith Island – at the fragile center of the Chesapeake Bay – rent a few scuba-diving suits and hold a town hall meeting under water?

Scientists say a huge part of the Chesapeake region could be below water in a few decades due to rapid global warming. So why not practice up? Just grab a few wetsuits and goggles and rehearse for the aquatic life to come.

Continue reading

Maldives underwater? Maryland's Smith Island will go first!

Yes I’m very concerned about the drowning nations of the South Pacific and Indian Ocean. But Maryland’s Smith Island — population 300, eighty miles from the White House — will be totally gone before any of these island nations disappear. See below my op-ed in today’s Baltimore Sun and watch a quick video about how global warming is ALREADY drowning AMERICAN islands right now.

Please join me and hundreds of thousands of other human beings worldwide this Saturday for the “International Day of Climate Action.” Visit www.350.org for an event near you, including a big one at Meridian Hill Park in Washington, DC from noon-5pm.

Rising seas, rising awareness
Climate change threatens to drown Maryland’s coasts and islands, but it’s not too late to act

By Mike Tidwell
Baltimore Sun
October 22, 2009

Here’s an idea: Why don’t the residents of Smith Island – at the fragile center of the Chesapeake Bay – rent a few scuba-diving suits and hold a town hall meeting under water?

Scientists say a huge part of the Chesapeake region could be below water in a few decades due to rapid global warming. So why not practice up? Just grab a few wetsuits and goggles and rehearse for the aquatic life to come.

A similar rehearsal took place last week in another island area: the archipelago nation of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean. Sitting at underwater tables, atop underwater chairs with fish darting about, the country’s president and Cabinet ministers held a “global warming summit” to ask the world to stop the rising seas that could eventually submerge their entire country.

But as TV networks broadcast this bizarre meeting back to the U.S., you could almost hear the “tsk, tsk.” We comfortable Americans tend to view really big catastrophes – things like famines and tsunamis – as far-away matters involving people usually too poor or under-educated to plan better.

This mindset helped blind us to the pre-Hurricane Katrina dangers of New Orleans. And it’s blinding us today to the shared threat of climate change in places like Smith Island, not to mention Manhattan Island and most of south Florida. Continue reading

Big day for our side; big blow to King Coal!

Not only was the Senate climate bill announced today, but Secretary Chu issued a dire warning to proponents of new coal-fired power plants and the EPA made two exciting announcements, further protecting our precious mountains and our planet from devastating practices.

Today, Senators Boxer and Kerry announced the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act. The President weighed in for the first time on the climate debate stating that his administration is “deeply committed” to passing a climate bill. We are excited to hear him make this long awaited statement. While this bill is an improvement over the house-passed American Clean Energy and Security Act, by strengthening the 2020 emissions by 3%, it still doesn’t go far enough to stop climate change. We look forward to working towards a strengthened bill that will provide for real change to the climate crisis.

It seems that addressing climate change is truly a top priority for the Obama Administration. Just yesterday, while touring the Jefferson Laboratory in Newport News, VA, Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu was specifically asked by reporters about the same proposed coal-fired power plant in the Hampton Roads region that CCAN is currently fighting. Secretary Chu commented that he favors delaying new coal plants until existing power plants have the capabilities of reducing harmful emissions.

Continuing the momentum, the EPA announced this morning that all 79 mountaintop removal permits currently being reviewed by the Army Corps of Engineers must undergo additional scrutiny. These permits were halted earlier this month until further investigation by the EPA which has determined that each and every permit would likely result in significant harm to water quality and the environment and are therefore not consistent with the requirements of the Clean Water Act. The next step is for the Corps and the EPA to work in “enhanced coordination” within a 60-day period. While the Corps can issue a permit without the EPA’s approval, the EPA can take action under section 404c of the CWA, allowing the agency to block Corps permits.

Later in the day, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, announced steps the agency will take in regulating greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act. The proposal will require large industrial facilities- including power plants- that emit at least 25,000 tons of GHGs annually, to obtain construction and operating permits to cover these emissions. The EPA estimates 14,000 facilities will be effected by the proposed emissions threshold.

So what does this all mean for Virginia? Well first, passing a climate bill has the potential for creating 46,000 clean energy jobs. These jobs can boost the clean energy economy of our Commonwealth while making us a leader in this sector. Regulating greenhouse gas emissions of power plants will make the already $6 billion coal-fired power plant proposed for Surry County even more costly for consumers. There are better solutions for our energy needs through energy efficiency programs and renewable energy projects. The EPA scrutiny over the 79 mountaintop removal permits shows that King Coal can no longer get its way by destroying communities and impacting our climate. This is a great day for the environmental movement- especially for those of us working in Virginia. We haven’t won the war but the battle victory is ours.
Continue reading

Health Care Pointless Without Climate Cure


Don’t put climate on back burner

By Mike Tidwell
July 7, 2009
Baltimore Sun

Barack Obama may have made history last November, but he seems deaf to history’s loudest call right now. The president clearly believes that health care reform, above all else, will define his early presidency. But even if Mr. Obama scores total success on health care, few future Americans will care or remember as long as the Earth’s ailing atmosphere goes untreated.

Climate change, it turns out, is the ultimate public health issue. And yet the House of Representatives passed a mere band-aid of a bill last month on global warming. Why so weak? Because Mr. Obama, with his 63 percent approval rating, was surprisingly AWOL for most the climate debate, essentially telling House leaders to hurry up and pass something – anything – so we can get on to the real issue of health care.

But cheap prescription drugs won’t do much good if our cities have filthy drinking water in coming years due to global warming. A “public option” on heath insurance? I’m all for it – but it will mean little if killer heat waves and mega-droughts parch the nation while Florida becomes a chain of malarial islands. Continue reading

Don't put climate on back burner

The Baltimore Sun

By Mike Tidwell

President Barack Obama may have made history last November, but he seems deaf to history’s loudest call right now. The president clearly believes that health care reform, above all else, will define his early presidency. But even if Mr. Obama scores total success on health care, few future Americans will care or remember as long as the Earth’s ailing atmosphere goes untreated.

Continue reading

What really happened in Bonn?

In our “Countdown to Copenhagen” weekly radio feature, Earthbeat Radio this week interviewed three leading U.S. policy advocates just back from the Bonn climate talks. What sort of leadership did the Obama team show in Bonn? How is the Waxman-Markey bill affecting the road to Copenhagen? Is the White House doing enough at home and aboard? Get answers from Angela Anderson of USCAN, Lou Leonard of WWF, and Karen Orenstein of Friends of the Earth.

Visit www.earthbeatradio.org and just click on “Listen Now.” You can also sign up for our weekly podcast to get the only weekly radio program in America dedicated exclusively to the climate crisis. This week we also look at “managed relocation” of plant and animal species due to climate change and we interview the world’s largest wind turbine company: Vestas of Denmark.

The best climate solution

The Baltimore Sun

By Mike Tidwell and Michael Noble

Now that the president and most Americans want national action on global warming, how do we pick the best legislation for reducing carbon pollution? There are three critical tests. First, is the climate policy simple? Second, is it fair? And third, is it built to last?

Continue reading