It’s Getting Hot In Here

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, January 26, 2007

Contact: Michael Crawford, Communications Director, Campus Climate Challenge,
202 247-0965 or Michael@energyaction.net

Contact: Will Duggan, Better Days Alliance, 860 345-0000, info@truthoncampus.org

LARGEST YOUTH MOBILIZATION ON GLOBAL WARMING: EVENTS ON 575 CAMPUSES
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH SCREENINGS WILL ANCHOR WEEK OF ACTION, JAN. 29 – FEB. 2

In the largest mobilization in the history of the youth global warming movement, students are rising up to demand immediate action to end our addiction to fossil fuels. Students on over 575 college and high school campuses across the United States and Canada are urging their campus administrators to enact clean energy policies as a key solution to the impending climate crisis. The demands are part of Rising to the Climate Challenge: Visions of Our Future, a week-long series of actions coordinated by the Campus Climate Challenge. “The Challenge” unites young people to win 100% clean energy policies at their schools.

Anchoring the week of action are hundreds of screenings of the Oscar-nominated documentary An Inconvenient Truth. In partnership with The 11th Hour Project and Truth on Campus, the Challenge is making copies of the DVD and public screening licenses available to college and high school campuses across the U.S. and Canada.

In addition to the film screenings, students are organizing rallies, educational forums and requesting meetings with members of Congress to urge that the U. S. take a leading role in reducing greenhouses gases. Events are planned in 49 states and 8 Canadian provinces.

Events include:

• Students at Rutgers University have collected 200 invitations sent to Rep. Frank Pallone D-NJ to at a screening and discussion of An Inconvenient Truth. The screening will also kick-off a campus-wide dorm competition to save energy.
• Students from Ivy League universities are joining together to call for their campuses to go climate neutral.
• January 30: Billionaires for Coal will be rallying outside the New York headquarters of Merrill Lynch to protest its investment in TXU, a company proposing to build 11 new coal power plants in Texas.
• January 31: West Virginia elementary school students will be presenting letters to Governor Manchin urging him to build them a new school away from the coal silo that sits 150 feet from their current school.

For a complete list of events during the week of action, please visit http://www.climatechallenge.org/woa.

“Students recognize that climate change is the most critical issue facing their generation. Throughout the Week of Action they are demanding less talk and more action to end our addiction to fossil fuels,” said Michael Crawford, communications director for the Campus Climate Challenge. “Beginning with their college campuses and extending to the halls of Congress, young people are sounding the alarm about global warming and providing real solutions that move us towards a clean energy future.”

“At American University, we have already held a successful student referendum to move the university towards wind-generated energy,” says student Claire Roby. “But that’s not enough. We are joining with students from around the country during the week of action to demand real solutions to stop global warming.”

“There is a growing sense of urgency about global warming among young people because we are the generation that will be most affected.,” says Andrew Nazdin, a freshman at the University of Maryland. “The week of action is a way for students to demand real solutions to end our addiction to fossil fuels.”

The Campus Climate Challenge, a project of the Energy Action Coalition, unites young people to organize on college campuses and high schools to win 100% clean energy policies at their schools. Energy Action Coalition is a network of 41 organizations from across the United States and Canada, founded and led by youth to help support and strengthen the student and youth clean energy movement in the United States and Canada.

Energy Action Coalition partners are: Americans for Informed Democracy, Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, Black Mesa Water Coalition, Brower New Leaders Initiative, California Student Sustainability Coalition, Campus Progress, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Clean Air Cool Planet, Climate Crisis Coalition, ConnPIRG, CoPIRG, Dakota Resource Council, Earth Day Network, Energy Justice Network, Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, Global Exchange, Greenpeace Student Network, Indigenous Environmental Network, INPIRG, Kids Against Pollution, League of Conservation Voters Education Fund: Project Democracy, League of Young Voters, MarylandPIRG, MASSPIRG, MoPIRG, National Association of Environmental Law Societies, National Wildlife Federation’s Campus Ecology Program, NJPIRG, OhioPIRG, OSPIRG, Rainforest Action Network, Restoring Eden, Sierra Student Coalition, Sierra Youth Coalition, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Student Environmental Action Coalition, Students United for a Responsible Global Environment, Sustainable Endowments Institute, SustainUS, Utah Clean Energy, WashPIRG, WISPIRG, Young People For and Youth Environmental Network.

Truthoncampus.org is helping colleges, universities and high schools across the country increase the positive outcomes from their screenings of “An inconvenient Truth.” Coordination is being led by Better Days Alliance, a Connecticut-based 501(c)(3) organization with support from Aveda, Annie’s Homegrown, Ben & Jerry’s Homemade, Clif Bar, Stonyfield Farm and the 11th Hour Project.

###

Week of Action Related Media Coverage so far:

1/9 (Open Press) – http://www.theopenpress.com/index.php?a=press&id=15534
1/9 (Grist magazine) – http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/1/9/133555/6274
1/19 (ABC News) – http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/GlobalWarming/story?id=2805553&page=1
1/22 (USA Today) – http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-01-23-eco-university_x.htm
1/23 (Arundel Digest, MD) – http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/01_23-11/TOP
1/25 (Southern MD Online) – http://somd.com/news/headlines/2007/5271.shtml
1/26 (OSU, the Lantern, OH)