Your vote = $200,000 for bold climate action

We just brought 12,000 people to Capitol Hill to demand bold federal climate and energy policy at Power Shift ’09, and now we have something even bigger up our sleeve.

Between now and the end of the year, we are about to take Power Shift ’09 home with one of the most comprehensive no-district-left-behind grassroots efforts for bold action on climate that’s ever been launched.

In order to pull it off in the biggest way possible (the only way to do things in our book), we’re going to need some serious resources.

And right now, there’s a very quick action you can take (without having to give a dime) to help us bring in $200,000.

http://www.justmeans.com/competitionidea/10404/promoteidea.html

Just click on the link and click “Support it!”
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ICC Action Alert!

Breathe the Air!
Breathe the Air!

Cross-Posted from: Here

If you live in Maryland(or if you know someone in Maryland who would be interested) this post is for you!

The bill being considered in the State Senate and House of Delegates right now would strip the Inter County Connector, a monstrous 18 mile highway being built in Maryland, of its 4 billion dollars worth of funding. The environmental implications of this road are far-reaching, and killing it would be a huge victory. Just related to global warming, the ICC is going to increase driving by 750 million miles a year by 2030, making it very difficult to reduce transportation emissions. At the same time it will deplete state funds that could go to mass transit.

Here are a couple of columns myself and a friend wrote on the ICC in case you want more info: column 1, column 2

I’m pleading with you to take 5-10 minutes of your time and e-mail or call all 3 of your delegates, and your state senator asking them to support to bill to defund the ICC. These are 4 calls/e-mails anyone who wants to stop global warming and protect the environment should be making. The action alert is below. Thanks so much.

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ACT: Please call 1-800-492-7122 Ask your Senator and Delegates to vote FOR
House Bill 27 / Senate Bill 753 to defund the Inter County Connector highway.

FIND: your Representatives at http://www.mdelect.net/electedofficials/ or http://www.congress.org/
or call the General Assembly switchboard at 1-800-492-7122
State Senator’s emails are firstname.lastname@senate.state.md.us

STATUS: Soon, the bill to defund the $4 billion dollar 20 mile long toll ICC highway will be heard in the House Appropriations & the Senate Budget & Taxation committees.

Opponents will try to kill the bill in committee, because if the bill gets to the floor of the full House or Senate, it becomes very difficult for legislators to oppose such a common-sense measure in such difficult economic times. We need your support to get this bill out of committee with a favorable committee report.

This is a good time to contact your representatives in Annapolis to let them know you want them to reduce wasteful spending and take a stand against this environmentally destructive project.

DESCRIPTION: There is debate on the amount of money that would be saved overall by not building the ICC since money has been spent already, however, let’s not throw good money after bad. The negative effects of building it (increased traffic congestion, global warming gas emissions) are too great.
Text of the bill http://mlis.state.md.us/2009rs/billfile/hb0027.htm
More information: http://maryland.sierraclub.org/action/p0157.asp

Please join us AND write your legislators to ask them to vote FOR HB27/SB753 to come out of committee and onto the floor. Thank you!

LTE Opportunity: Time for federal action

Like me, I know that you are probably thinking about more than just green beer this St. Patrick’s Day. With global warming being one of the three main priorities laid out by President Obama, the state is set for action this year. But with the recession on everyone’s minds, we need to make sure that every member of Congress knows that America is ready for bold action on climate change in 2009.

That’s where you all come in. One of the most effective tools of advocacy is the letter to the editor – you get your message out to hundreds of readers, including citizens, newspaper editors, and politicians. The next two months are going to be crucial in ensuring that Congress gets the message, so I’m asking you to make a commitment now to submit 3 letters by Memorial Day. Why Memorial Day? Because Congressman Henry Waxman, head of the Energy and Commerce Committee, has pledged that he will get a carbon cap out of committee by Memorial Day, and he needs our support!

The first thing to make clear? The urgency of taking climate action!

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Who wants a green job?

The real question is: who doesn’t want a green job?

Right now, we have a really amazing window of opportunity to bring green jobs home. In the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ie Stimulus Package), there was a whopping $87 billion of investments in awesome green stuff, including investments in clean energy, energy efficiency, and green jobs training.

This is sort of old news, though, so why am I bringing this up now? Right now, states, cities, and counties across the nation are deciding how this money will be spent. And you can bet that corporations and the folks who are used to business-as-usual are in City Halls and State Houses across the nation lobbying to be the ones who get those investments to create “green jobs” – that help their bottom line, of course.

What do we want? We want green jobs to really be for everyone. And there’s a very small window to make sure that this happens – localities are setting up programs as I’m typing this post, and the window of opportunity will end in the next month. So Green For All is working with citizens across the nation on setting up actions so that we make sure that all voices are heard as local governments are making these important investments. Want to get involved? Sign up for an action, learn more about the green recovery, and bring those green jobs to everyone in your hometown.

Shell-Shocked

This has been cross posted from: here

It’s a shame that after a couple of posts involving businesses making the right decisions in the renewable energy market and taking action on climate change, I end up having to break the news that Shell has eliminated all investment in renewables besides biodiesel. It’s not as though Shell was doing very much anyways, they have invested 1.7 billion dollars over the past 5 years in renewables. In comparison, they spend 32 billion total on investments in 2008 alone. Still, this is a sign that Shell is moving in the opposite direction of a lot of businesses and corporations. While we’re seeing an increase in renewable energy output and investment amongst companies, Shell is taking theirs away.

Obviously I’m not one of the “experts” in Shell making these kinds of multi-billion dollar decisions, but I have to wonder what is going through their minds. Let’s assume the obvious, which is that Shell has no moral conscience at all when it comes to climate change or environmental protection. Their bottom line is more important than the public good. I got it, they’re a business. Unfortunately expecting a moral conscience of some corporations is expecting too much.

But even if you’re only thinking of your bottom line, how do you come to this conclusion that no only will we not invest much money in renewables, but we won’t invest ANYTHING. I can see how this would’ve been a good move in 2000 when we had oilmen coming into the Whitehouse. There were lots of calls for increased drilling, removal of environmental protections, and no action on climate change. At this point, putting all the eggs in the oil basket might make sense. But let’s look at what the state of things are now with the next 8 years in mind, as opposed to the last 8 years.

We’ve got an anti-drilling Democratically controlled Congress and Whitehouse. Environmental regulations are going to be popping up all over the place. If you look at the stimulus, the overwhelming majority of the money relating to energy was clean energy. There was also a record amount of money invested in mass transit. Whatever tax breaks the oil companies got during the last 8 years are likely going to be removed. There are now new and far reaching tax breaks at the Federal level for solar, wind, geothermal, biodiesel, and plug-in hybrid-electric cars. These kinds of credits are also showing up all over the states. My own state of Maryland has a 10k credit for solar, similar incentives for other alternatives, and my county Prince Georges County has a 5,000 dollar property tax credit. General Motors and Toyota are coming out with plug-in hybrids within the next few years. Other auto companies are taking a stronger look at it them, and are introducing more hybrids. Oh, and the US and other countries around the world either have passed or are about to pass climate change cap and trade policy that will inevitably drive up the price of gas and decrease consumption.

I could go on. Hopefully you get the point. What are you thinking Shell? The problem I see with this when you’re purely looking at a bottom line is that the trends are moving in the opposite direction of Shell’s actions. It’s not smart investment to put none of the $$$ into renewables when you consider the trends I listed above. I predict that Shell is going to find itself at a big competitive disadvantage a few years from now when they suddenly realize they “want in” on this clean energy economy, but other companies beat them to the investment, research, and start-up and have achieved greater economies of scale and efficiency. At this point, entry into the clean energy market will hurt Shell, and they will look back on their decision in 2009 to cease renewable energy investment as poor planning.

Clean Coal was Never Being Developed by Bush Admin!

This is cross-posted from: here

I’ve documented plenty of reasons why coal use needs to be phased out, and “clean coal” is a joke. In case you need a recap…..The coal industry has gotten a lot of much deserved negative press ever since the coal slurry dam disaster that happened a few months ago. This brought to light that, maybe we should regulate our coal ash. Of course, no amount of regulation will ever make Continue reading

Take Action: Investments in Efficiency Targeted for Cuts

A couple years ago, the Maryland legislature passed this sweet bill called the Healthy Air Act to clean up our dirty electricity generation. Part of what made the bill so excellent was that it mandated that MD join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (fondly known as RGGI, and pronounced ReGGIe, like the name), the first ever carbon cap program in the United States.

Now that the pollution permit auctions are starting to happen, and the dollars are rolling in, we’re running into some trouble. Last year, the MD General Assembly passed a law stating that the revenues from RGGI would be divided between energy efficiency programs and low-income ratepayer relief. Now that there are budget shortfalls left and right, the RGGI funds – specifically the part that has been set aside for investments in energy-efficiency programs – are being raided. Most of the money is being transferred into additional rate-relief programs.

So why are we worried? With electricity bills on the rise, the threat of global warming, and the economic crisis we’re dealing with, energy efficiency is the clear solution to helping us use less energy, lower our bills, AND do good for the environment at the same time. Funding efficiency programs will lower bills for ratepayers. Permanently.

Oh, and this will also create green jobs – doing things like this:

We can help people pay their bills and lower their bills at the same time, but only if we stick to the plan set forth by the general assembly last year.

Want to take action? If your Senator serves on the Budget Committee, or your Delegate serves on the Appropriations committee, they need to hear from you TODAY. The committees will take up this question in the budget early next week, so it’s important that they hear from as many of their constituents as possible telling them not to steal $70 million from energy efficiency, so take a minute to take action. (don’t know who your Senator/Delegate is? find out here!) Seriously. Take action now!

Powering Past Coal

It was tremendous to be part of the crowd of thousands of people demonstrating last Monday, March 2nd at the coal-fired Capitol Power Plant on Capitol Hill. But I wonder how many of those who have heard about this action or who even took part are aware of the role that the Power Past Coal campaign played in making it a success.

power past coal

In mid-November, 2008 I traveled to Charleston, West Virginia for the first national climate meeting following the election of our nation’s first African American President. Representatives were there from two dozen groups, many of them Appalachian-based, others national groups like the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Energy Action, 1Sky and Rainforest Action Network. Over the course of a day and a half we came up with a plan for “100 Days of Action to Power Past Coal.” This campaign began on the day after Barack Obama’s inauguration.
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