Gus Speth: The important thing is for people to redouble their efforts. Now that we’ve got a fighting chance, we really have to fight. We all should be engaged with a Green New Deal. I think one reason the idea is getting so much attention is that it is not just about climate and the environment. They are seeing the connections …
Cost, comfort emphasized as building electrification takes off in Colorado
Allen Best, Nov 2019 Boulder, Colorado. A Boulder campaign is making a pitch to residents that they can save money and breathe easier by switching from gas. Comfort, not climate, is the central message of a campaign in Colorado to persuade homeowners to switch from natural gas to electricity for heating and other indoor purposes. The joint program sponsored by …
Democratization and Putting People at the Center in a Just Transition, Political Reform and the Green New Deal
By Evan Casper-Futterman and Jason Spicer, Metropolitiques.euNovember 18, 2019 | CREATE! Earlier this year, US Representative Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez introduced a Congressional resolution for a Green New Deal (GND), an idea since supported by a number of 2020 Democratic presidential candidates. The resolution calls for “transparent and inclusive consultation, collaboration, and partnership with frontline and vulnerable communities, labor unions, worker cooperatives, civil-society groups, academia, and businesses.” To some, the reference to …
Plan, Mood, Battlefield – Reflections on the Green New Deal
Thea Riofrancos May 16, 2019 Plan, Mood, Battlefield – Reflections on the Green New DealPDF Climate scientists are beginning to sound like radicals. The 2018 IPCC report concluded that “unprecedented changes across all aspects of society” would be needed to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. In its devastating report on the dire state of the planet’s ecosystems, the UN’s panel on Biodiversity …
Ways to meet climate goals: the short list of climate actions that will work
September 29th, 2019 by Michael Barnard, Clean Technica cleantechnica.com/2019/09/29/the-short-list-of-climate-actions-that-will-work/ I spend a lot of time critiquing solutions for low-carbon transformation, and that leads, inevitably, to people asking me: what works? What should we be doing? Most recently, that came in the form of a question on Quora that was well enough formed to trigger me to write down the solution set: “What exactly …
Transitions that work: The principles include strong governmental support, dedicated funding streams, strong and diverse coalitions, and economic diversification
The principles include strong governmental support, dedicated funding streams, strong and diverse coalitions, and economic diversification. The case of Tonawanda, New York, where the coal-fired power plant shut down, highlights how many of these principles work in practice. There, a diverse coalition, including the Kenmore Teachers Association, the Western New York Area Labor Federation, the United Steelworkers of America, Tonawanda, …
Green New Deal Plus Clean Energy for Developing World
Only a Global Green New Deal Can Save the Planet. And Bernie Sanders has a plan for that. By Tom Athanasiou, Sept 17, 2019, The Nation Unveiled on August 22, when his presidential campaign visited Paradise, California, the once-idyllic town incinerated by last summer’s record wildfires, Sanders’s Green New Deal envisions “a ten-year, nationwide mobilization centered around justice and equity.” …
Al Gore: We can do it, but we need significant policy change and new people in office
Sept. 20, 2019, NYTimes Things take longer to happen than you think they will, but then they happen much faster than you thought they could. The destructive impacts of the climate crisis are now following the trajectory of that economics maxim as horrors long predicted by scientists are becoming realities. More destructive Category 5 hurricanes are developing, monster fires ignite and …
Getting to 100% in Cities
by John Farrell, ILSR, 2018. Updated presentation. Resolutions Go for 100%: Over 70 U.S. cities have set goals to get all of their electricity from renewable sources within 15-20 years, offering lower costs and more local energy production. Listen to podcasts with the pioneers––http://bit.ly/VoicesOf100 Commit to developing local renewable energy: In Taos, N.M., and Minneapolis, Minn., city officials have set …
Curbed, Sept 2019 But before any new infrastructure can be designed, we have to reframe what infrastructure actually means in America’s consciousness. “Right now the term ‘infrastructure’ as used by politicians is problematic,” says Vishaan Chakrabarti, an architect, incoming dean at UC Berkeley’s College of Environmental Design, and author A Country of Cities: A Manifesto for an Urban America. In the …