Russ Vernon-Jones

love, justice, and climate change … I know you can make a difference.

Collective action

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March to End Fossil Fuels

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This past Sunday I participated in the “March to End Fossil Fuels” in New York City. What an exhilarating experience! Thousands of people jammed the streets of New York to demand an end to fossil fuels. People of different races and ages came together to show how much they care about what climate change is doing to our world and its inhabitants. There was chanting, singing, drumming and dancing. Voices were united in “What do we want? Climate justice! When do we want it? Now!”

It’s estimated that over 75,000 people marched in New York. New York’s grassroots organizations and people from frontline communities headed up the march. Black, Indigenous, Latinex, Asian and Pacific Islander groups led the procession, followed by youth, elders, workers, people of faith, and people of all backgrounds. According to Oil Change International, this was only one of more than 700 end-fossil-fuel actions in 65 countries, with more than 600,000 people participating just in the past week.

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I Don’t Like Bad News

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I don’t like bad news. I don’t like reading that July 3, 4, and 6 each set a new record for the hottest average global temperature on Earth, for as long as records have been kept and, according to scientists’ best estimates, the hottest day in the last 125,000 years.

I don’t like reading that parts of China are suffering under a prolonged heat wave with temperatures up to 110° F; that 1.8 million Muslims on the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia encountered 118°F temperatures; or that scientists are alarmed at the “totally unprecedented” heat wave in the waters of the North Atlantic–melting sea ice and disrupting important currents.

I don’t like reading that wealthy nations and corporations blocked significant progress at the June UN climate session in Bonn, Germany that was designed to prepare proposals for the next big UN climate conference, COP 28, this coming December. “The Bonn Climate Conference laid bare the glaring hypocrisy of wealthy nations, showcasing a remarkable indifference to the struggles of developing countries,” said Harjeet Singh, head of global political strategy at Climate Action Network, which includes more than 1,500 civil society groups.

So, what do we do with bad climate news? I think it is important that we all develop workable approaches to this situation. We are certainly going to encounter plenty more bad news about the climate crisis in the months and years ahead. We don’t want ….

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Why Can’t We Move Faster on Climate?

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What is it that has stopped the United States from dealing successfully with the climate crisis? We’ve known for at least 3 decades that we needed to act, but instead we’ve allowed the problem to get much worse. Is it the climate deniers? Is it people not taking lowering their “personal carbon footprints” seriously enough? Is it politicians who just don’t get it?

No! It is none of the above. The big barrier has been the fossil fuel companies–and the way they exert political power and manipulate public opinion. Climate denial was created by a deceitful disinformation campaign funded by ExxonMobil and others. The whole idea of a “personal carbon footprint” was a ploy invented by the PR department of BP Oil to distract the public from the huge responsibility borne by the fossil fuel industry. The politicians have been paid not to “get it.” Senator Joe Manchin, who recently sank the Build Back Better bill, has his own financial stake in the coal industry, and he also has taken in more the $400,000 in donations from oil and gas companies just in the last few months. He’s also the top lifetime recipient of oil, gas, and coal money among all those in Congress.

These companies have pursued their own profit and greed with abandon, while knowing that their very business itself was creating a climate crisis that threatens the existence of civilization as we know it. They have expanded their extraction and marketing dramatically, while climate scientists have been making it clear that fossil fuels must be eliminated entirely. They have used money, lies, and high-paid public relations experts to undermine every effort to address the climate crisis.

A new report, just out, ….

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“Dangerous Radicals”

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If earlier reports from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were wake-up calls to take climate action, the one released in early April is a blaring emergency horn that the world dare not ignore. In a statement accompanying the report, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that the failure of governments and corporations to keep pledges and take effective climate action has “put us firmly on track toward an unlivable world.”

The report indicates that in order to keep global warming within the 1.5°C target, greenhouse gas emissions can continue to rise for only 3 more years. They must fall 43% by 2030. The scientists report that this is still possible, but that unless transformative climate action is taken in the next 8 years, the 1.5°C target will be out of reach forever. Unless countries step up their reductions in emissions, we are on course for a global temperature rise of 2.4°C to 3.5°C. This would bring unimaginable devastation to populations everywhere.

I have not plowed through the entire 3,675 pages of this latest report, but in the summaries and articles about it there are items of good news. The first is ….

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Adams Brook, Shutesbury, MA
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Examples of Climate Action and an Invitation to Join In

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In my previous post I offered some “tips on stepping up our climate action” and encouraged us all to take action more frequently despite any feelings of discouragement or despair. I proposed that we each 1) decide to act, 2)take some action, 3) be pleased that we have acted, 4) repeat the first 3 steps again, over and over.

While I mentioned some possible actions in that post, it seems that some more specific, personal examples might be useful.

I’m not yet as bold and effective in my climate action as I aspire to be, but I do persist and do a number of things that are helping me get connected to other people and, I believe, make a difference. In the hope that these examples will lead you to think further about what you want to do, here are a few of the things I’ve been engaged in recently.

I learned, through an email from 350.org, that a federal judge voided a huge sale of drilling leases in the Gulf of Mexico that the federal government had recently completed. This is such good news, because …

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Tips for Stepping Up Our Action on Climate Change

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We continue to make slow progress on climate change in the United States. More of the population is concerned about the situation, more political leaders are advocating action, and a few businesses are reducing their carbon footprints. But slow progress is not what we need in the climate emergency we are facing. Only dramatic acceleration of our action on climate will give us any chance of avoiding global catastrophe.

With the failure of the Congress to pass the Build Back Better bill and with big businesses mostly trying to improve their PR campaigns instead of actually cutting emissions, it is clear that neither government nor business on their own can be relied on to solve this crisis. Only a very large people’s movement demanding bold action has any chance of accelerating action sufficiently.

We have a good climate movement in the U.S. with bold solutions, but it needs far more people actively engaged. I propose that most of us could be more engaged, and all of us could be doing more to get other people join in taking action.

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An Arrest While Protesting Climate Inaction … and GMI

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Last Wednesday I was arrested in front of the White House in Washington, D.C. while participating in a “People vs. Fossil Fuels” protest action. We are demanding that President Biden keep promises he made during the presidential campaign and use his executive power to 1) end federal support for fossil fuel projects, 2) declare a national climate emergency, 3) speed the end of the fossil fuel era, and 4) launch a just, renewable energy revolution.

We engaged in non-violent, intentional civil disobedience to …

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Local Climate Action Drives the Movement Forward

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On a number of occasions, I’ve encouraged you who read my blog to join a local climate organization and get involved in some project with them. A problem as large and systemic as the climate crisis is not going to be solved by individuals acting alone. There is power in numbers.

I thought you might be interested to know what my experience has been in getting involved with a local climate organization, and also to learn how one small organization has made a difference and contributed to the larger climate movement.

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The Only Path to Climate Success?

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Good news abounds on the climate front. More solar and wind power is being installed all over the world. The international financial industry is slowly but surely withdrawing support for fossil fuel projects. The President of the U.S. is aiming for net-zero carbon emissions from the electric grid by 2035 and is moving legislation forward to support climate action.

Yet the overall picture with our climate is still quite dire and getting worse.

Seven things you can do to make a difference.

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A Conversation with Isioma

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Last week, through the wonders of Zoom, I had the opportunity to meet and talk with Isioma, a Black woman in Lagos, Nigeria. She told me that the rains that traditionally fall reliably at this time of year in her country are not falling and that disaster looms for farmers and cattle herders. She said that because of drought many grazing lands have been exhausted. Conflicts are arising as herders seeking dwindling reserves of pasture clash with farmers and each other. She shared her sadness that so many Nigerians have been made homeless by the effects climate change. She called them “refugees within their own country.”

I’ve read about these things in news reports, but it was a new experience for me to be sitting in comfort in my home in the United States developing a friendship with this woman, while she was in Nigeria experiencing climate disaster firsthand. I began to think about the fact that my country, the United States, has played a big role in causing the suffering being experienced around her. Cumulatively the U.S. has emitted more climate-change-causing greenhouse gases than any other nation.

Just as I was pondering the responsibility of the U.S., she said to me, “I don’t think we can stop climate change without doing something about racism. The wealthy white nations don’t care what happens to us. It’s racism that makes them not care.” Even though I’ve made similar statements myself, it cut right to my core to hear it directly from her. I’m still shaken by it.

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Plastics – Another Front in the Campaign to Save Our Climate and Health

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Globally, we produce about 310 million tons of plastic each year, about half of which is single use items such as shopping bags, plates, cups, straws, and packaging. Total production is expected to go up to somewhere between 750 million tons to a billion tons per year by 2050, unless big changes occur.

Plastic is made from fossil fuels. Greenhouse gasses are emitted at every stage of its lifecycle. The emissions begin with methane that’s emitted in the extraction of fracked oil and gas and continue …

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