It’s Getting Hot In Here

Area fire and ambulance crews arrive near the scene in Middletown, Conn., Sunday, Feb. 7, 2010. Multiple people have died in an explosion at a power plant in Connecticut and an unknown number of people are injured. (AP Photo/Richard Messina, Hartford Courant)

This morning, at 11:30 am, Middletown’s Kleen Energy Power Plant suffered a major explosion,  believed to be when a gas line caught fire during testing. Friends who work at the plant said that there were 50 – 100 construction workers, engineers, and plant managers who were inside. As of 12 pm, Middletown firefighters had only found 9 individuals. Since then, five* have been reported dead, with casualties and injuries expected to be many more. Firefighters from around the state came into the plant, with Hartford and Boston’s search-and-rescue teams both coming to Middletown to help clear the wreckage and free workers still stuck inside.

Workers at the plant were working long shifts, trying to finish the plant on a tight schedule. Matthew Lesser, Middletown’s representative to state government, said, “As I understand it, they were testing a gas line when the explosion took place but we’re not sure. Our first priority is making sure that everyone there is safe.” Continue reading ‘CT Gas Power Plant Explosion Reminds Fossil Fuels are Deadly’

It’s been incredible to read many of the reflections during this month’s Climate Generation series, and I’m honored to have a chance to think about the movement and where we stand now. I’m so grateful that so much of my history in the movement has already been shared in the telling of our history in this series – from meetings in college basements to meetings on Capital Hill; from the hundreds at the Northeast Climate Conference to thousands at PowerShift; from Stepping it Up on campus to stepping it up worldwide on October 24; from first singing “It’s Hot in Here” while marching in Montreal to a vigil of thousands in Copenhagen. I am so grateful to have shared the growth of the movement with you.

It’s also been wonderful to read about what the movement here in the US has been mulling over the past two years, while I’ve been on the other side of the planet, working in India with the Indian Youth Climate Network and the early stages of so many other international youth movements on climate change. I have been so lucky to learn so much from my peers globally and to have been forced to rethink all assumptions, particularly about how change happens. In many ways, our theories of change differ dramatically worldwide, as do the tactics that feel most natural to create change. If we want to continue to build a global movement, we must continue building our respect for these diverse approaches and diverse tactics.

Continue reading ‘Climate Generation: Diverse Tactics Driving Change’

For detailed updates as it happens, follow some of our writers on Twitter:

Ben Powless -   Zoë Caron -   Juan Hoffmaister -   Matthew Carroll -   Liz McDowell -   Caroline Howe

Note: Matt’s incredible description of the beginning of this session are fabulous. You can check out our live notes, or our summary as it follows here.

11:53 Debating the “Noting” of Copenhagen Accord

Currently, the parties are debating whether or not to “note” the Copenhagen Accord. This means that the document we’ve been debating for 10 hours will be seen as a document that any delegation could sign onto. So, we’re proposing countries sign on if they agree with it. It couldn’t be agreed to because of the process by which it was created. I’m confused. And sad. There’s not much to write, because we’re lost on what part of our future is disappearing right now.

10:25 Meeting Begins Again

After more than two hours, the session began again, chaired by those who are slightly less exhausted. The plenary hall has no windows, so its hard to tell if any time has passed at all.

7:47 Imperfect, but a Beginning?

Gabon used the message, “Every human endeavor and creation is imperfect, but we also have to continue to fashion the stone, to sculpt because tomorrow will be better than today.” The consensus is generally emerging that this document (a non legally-binding framework) may be a way for things to move to the next phase of negotiations. It is imperfect, but Continue reading ‘Liveblog: Copenhagen End Game (Continued)’

This post is part of Blog Action Day, 8414 blogs and counting, all writing about climate change on the same day and together calling the US to take serious action on climate. Sign their petition here. This is cross-posted from indiaclimatesolutions.com

Here in India, we started on the Road to 350 a long time ago. It’s been one year since I quit my job and decided to drive across India in solar powered and electric cars with 350 literally written all over them (that’s our Revalution to the right!), to show the world that there is a Road to 350, a path paved with solutions that is beautiful, powerful, and inspiring. We worked to demonstrate that there is no silver bullet, there is no single solution — that there are 350 and counting! The Road to 350 drives straight through October 24, straight through COP15, and straight onto the future that we are creating every day we wake up and commit to being the change. As it gets closer to October 24, I’m more and more inspired by those actions planned that are showing what the Road to 350 looks like – what our world of solutions will be!

One of my all time favorite 350 actions is the image taken in Granada, Spain, where Rene turned solar cookers into a gleaming visual representation of 350 as part of his Sahara project bringing solar ovens to the region of North Africa. It reminded me of the incredible solar cookers all across India that we saw, and of course of the day that Anna cooked Maggi noodles on the roof of Manzil; our time in Vasant Kunj solar festival when women cooked pakora for all of us; or eating solar cooked food at Deepak Gadhia’s tribal girls school in Gujarat. We saw so many solutions that I hope these organizations will highlight similarly on October 24. It doesn’t have to be a 350 made of solar cookers, but a 350 made of pakoras cooked by the sun!! I am grateful to Rene for showing just how many people will benefit from these incredible machines, saving our forests and our air!

Tantoh Nforbah and his community group, Save Your Future Association, in northwestern Cameroon planted flowers with the message “CO2 350 PPM” to promote carbon reductions, community development and sustainable agriculture in the region, while 350 Dominicana gathered to help with a local reforestation project and take a 350 action photo. All around the world, and all across Delhi, people are planning to plant or distribute 350 trees in their neighborhoods, their schools, or their cities.

In the City of Mandurah in Western Australia, they will be celebrating October 24th through a ‘350 Bulb Swap’ – where they will be swapping 350 incandescent bulbs for energy efficient CFL bulbs. The event will be held at the Sustainable Mandurah Home, a modern hands-on display home where, after they have swapped their bulbs, visitors can learn how to make their home more cost effective (through energy efficiency measures) and environmentally sensitive.

There are so many more! There’s some more of my favorites after the break, and tons more at 350.org

Continue reading ‘The Road to 350 is Paved With Solutions’

I always thought it was a little overly dramatic when people used to say, with that gleam of fire in their eyes and intense certainty in their voices, “The next world war will be fought over water.” I didn’t notice their resigned sadness after saying that and seeing the response of the audience, of my response.

Water wars, we imagined, were decades away. Climate refugees fleeing drought and devastation would be seen in generations, not in ours. People would recognize when resources were becoming so scarce and develop cooperative strategies for conservation long before it came to the point of fighting over them. Right?

The sad climate “joke” five years ago was that we’d need to bring melting icebergs to sub-Saharan Africa to support life. But in Kenya today, aid workers are already flying water in from other countries. Today, thousands of men and women are already dying from lack of the most basic human need — water.

Today, when I repeat the phrase – “Wars will be fought over water” – with the same confidence and intensity, the same fire, and the same resigned sadness, I know that fights over water are not generations – or even years – away. We may not have another world war, but I have no question that we will see more devastation and violence, if we need to see any more than the lives being lost every day in Kenya.

There is no water to drink, let alone have water to wash hands to prevent the spread of diarrheal diseases. There is no water to drink, let alone have water to farm. Lakes have been retreating for years as water is used for farming, for geothermal energy, and for survival, and the lakes’ disappearances are threatening not only water animals like flamingos and hippos, but all of the biodiversity for which Kenya is famous.

At the same time, in India, thousands of farmers commit suicide annually due to desperation caused by cycles of debt, but also cycles of increasing drought and irregular rain. Farmers who would rather die than face the shame and sadness of watching their families die of starvation, have killed not only themselves but their families as well. This year has been one of India’s worst monsoons in recent history, with too little rains coming too late, and often all at once.

On the brink of death, is there a question of anything but desperation?

Read more on what we can expect – and what we can do. Continue reading ‘Water: When Nightmares Come True’

It was a funny day in Durham earlier this week, when after two years of international climate change lobbying, it all came home! Senator Chris Dodd arrived to celebrate the Durham Fair (one of Connecticut’s largest fall events) and parked his car at my house, a serendipitous lobbying opportunity occurred. Along with my district’s representative to the Connecticut state legislature and Senate, we discussed the role of green jobs and clean energy to rebuild Connecticut’s and America’s economy, while also setting us on target to a bold, equitable, and science-based agreement in Copenhagen that will bring the planet back to 350 ppm.

Senator Dodd was enthusiastic and agreed that he would work to ensure strong energy policy in the United States in the coming months. Meanwhile, Connecticut representatives Matt Lesser and Ed Meyer agreed to continue to push through Connecticut’s solar energy policy and ensure that the energy efficiency stimulus funds actually get distributed to the families that need it most to stay warm this winter and stay green all year long. At the fair, lots of people commented on the sign, and singers from The Guess Who shared their support for 350 as well, after a crowd of 25,000 heard them sing “Share the Land” and explain that we’re all in the same canoe! We are all on this planet, this canoe, together, and it’s time to bring messages around the world and back home.

Martin Luther King said, more than 40 years ago, “We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now.”

I have had, in the past week, three moments in which it struck me — Tomorrow IS today. Everything we imagined for the future is happening right now.

1. Nations are Disappearing. Entire Nations. Now. I heard the President of  Kiribati say to the Minister of State of the Maldives that Australia was finally willing to take his refugees; that they had agreed to train his citizens so they could move as recruited migrants and not as refugees. He said, “When my nation is uninhabitable, my citizens will be working sustainably all over the world.” The Minister of the Maldives said he would never see his nation underwater and uninhabitable, that he would never leave. Continue reading ‘Tomorrow is Today’

He listened! Obama listened!

We chanted during PowerShift’s march on the Capital Coal Plant and even later that night outside of the While House calling for “Food, Not Bombs! Plant a Garden on the White House Lawn!” It sounded good, and I remember seeing the lights go on in an upstairs window as we sang late at night, but maybe that was just a twinkle in the White House’s eye.

Either way, I just learned that Obama did plant a nice big vegetable garden on the White House lawn in March, the first since Eleanor Roosevelt’s Victory Gardens, and things are coming up golden. They’ve 90 pounds of food,  enough produce for the White House kitchens and local soup kitchens as well.  Good and always with honor have released a detailed map of the White House Garden – let’s hope more people follow suit, eating as locally as physically possible, their own backyards!

Perplexed by the inter-related problems India faces as it develops at the cost of 2/3 rd of its population living outside the economy, two young activists from Switch ON, rode their cycles 1800 kilometers across India through the coal belt – to question India’s growth based on fossil fuel, and to seek and highlight alternatives for a sustainable and equitable development.

Why New Coal gives a new perspective to Coal in India – addressing India’s growing energy needs, problems of energy security and Climate Change Vulnerabilities – by interviewing experts across the nation, while also documenting Vinay and Hoob’s epic journey across the nation.

Continue reading ‘Why New Coal?’

I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t constantly on the move — around the world, across India, through Delhi, or pacing across my bedroom. It’s probably true for most of the youth movement. But, maybe that’s what works – messages that move. That move us, and that move themselves.

It’s been six months today since we launched the Climate Solutions Road Tour and began our journey across India, 3500 kilometers in solar electric Indian-made cars, which took us farther than we’d ever imagined — from the NY Times to skype calls with groups of young people in the Philippines, Israel, Sweden, Brazil, Mexico, US, and the UK who are hitting the ground on their bicycles, their electric cars, their trains and their own feet to see what solutions they find — to create, communicate and celebrate change, as we had tried to here.

There have been so many journeys that inspired us – the Road to Detroit and the BioBus, the Australian youth Overland journey to Poznan, Rolling Sunlight and even Guster’s eco band tour – to set off across India in solar supported electric cars, with a solar band and a vision to showcase the solutions we knew were around us. We wanted to build trust and confidence between nations, and never realized the most important was building this in ourselves.

I’m getting restless, again, so its time for another move. But now, where I go, the message moves, too — Yes we can! So we will.

Continue reading ‘Messages that Move’