Today I got 28 Power Vote pledge cards signed by a wide range of excited people from 13 different schools, including people from middle schoolers to overhearing parents. Yesterday Ohio Power Voters dropped a banner at McCain’s VP rally in Dayton, and today 3 of us canvassed the crowd at Obama and Biden’s tour stop here in Columbus.

Now we’ve got dozens more people to develop into leaders and invite to the 2nd annual Ohio Area Student Environmental Summit in 2 weeks.

Also, wearing a Power Vote shirt was very effective. People even came up and asked me about the campaign - that’s never happened to me before.

So that’s what I did for Power Vote today. What did you do?

In stark contrast with Senator Barack Obama’s energy policy, which he described last night calling for millions of new green jobs, improved national security, and reduced global warming pollution, John McCain today announced that his running mate, Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska, doesn’t believe in anthropogenic climate change or evolution. Combine all of this with the fact that Ms. Palin’s husband works for British Petroleum drilling in North Alaska, that she doesn’t believe that climate change science is clear or that the changes are caused by mankind’s greenhouse gas emissions and  the fact that she wants to drill in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge to guarantee our energy security rather than pursuing renewable energies, and you’ve got one of the worst climate candidates yet! Even John McCain has spoken vocally to protect ANWR, so his selection of one of the nation’s biggest supporters for drilling there has been a major blow,

She actively campaigned against the petition to get the polar bear included on the Endangered Species List, and sued the Secretary of the Interior when that decision was made, saying that the climate change models cited by scientists and environmentalists that predict melting of Arctic ice due to climate change are “unreliable.” 

When asked in a Newsmax interview, what was her take on global warming and how it is affecting the United States, Sarah Palin said, “A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.” What? Where has she been!?!

“Ms. Palin has made it clear through her actions that she is unwilling to do even as much as the Bush administration to address the impacts of global warming,” said Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund. Now that’s saying something if she isn’t even willing to do as much as Bush! Meanwhile, League of Conservation Voters President, Gene Karpinski, has said, “Unfortunately, with her support for drilling in the Arctic Refuge and off our coasts, Governor Palin will simply continue the failed policies of the Bush-Cheney administration and their Big Oil friends - policies that could make us even more dependent on foreign oil.”

As Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin was very vocal with regards to her dislike of the petition to the Secretary of the Interior to list the polar bear as an endangered species. This petition (eventually successful) made it mandatory for the Environmental Protection Agency to take action to mitigate climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to protect the polar bear. Ms. Palin was actively against this move, and in her op-ed to the New York Times in January 2008, Ms. Palin said:

“In fact, there is insufficient evidence that polar bears are in danger of becoming extinct within the foreseeable future… The possible listing of a healthy species like the polar bear would be based on uncertain modeling of possible effects. The Center for Biological Diversity, which petitioned for the polar bear to be protected, wants the listing to force the government to either stop or severely limit any public or private action that produces, or even allows, the production of greenhouse gases. Such limits should be adopted through an open process in which environmental issues are weighed against economic and social needs, and where scientists debate and present information that policy makers need to make the best decisions… Americans should become involved in the issue of climate change by offering suggestions for constructive action to their state governments. But listing the polar bear as threatened is the wrong way to get to the right answer.”

In May, after the court did decide to list polar bears as endangered species, Sarah Palin filed suit, saying, ”We believe that the Service’s decision to list the polar bear was not based on the best scientific and commercial data available.” In response, Kassie Siegel of the Center for Biological Diversity, the lead author of the petition that led to the listing, called the lawsuit “completely ridiculous and a waste of the court’s time… This lawsuit and her head-in-the-sand approach to global warming only helps oil companies, certainly not Alaska or the polar bear. Gov. Palin should be working for sustainable, clean energy development in Alaska instead of extinction for the polar bear.”

The Environment News Service reported on a number of interesting elements within her candidacy. For one, while Governor Palin did increase the taxes on big oil companies’ profits operating in Alaska and created a Cabinet of Climate Change in Alaska, her focus on energy independence has entirely been on drilling in American oil fields, including the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge, a fact that even John McCain has spoken against. Her cabinet group is tasked with addressing climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Alaska, though she has given them no binding targets. She very superficially has proclaimed September as Energy Efficiency Month in Alaska. The proclamation encourages Alaskans to lower their costs by conserving energy and by using existing energy more efficiently.

“Conserving energy and using it more efficiently doesn’t necessarily mean you have to sacrifice your quality of life,” she said. “It’s the little things, like making sure lights, computers and appliances are turned off – and slowing down on the road, which will save money spent on gasoline.” It’s true that it is great to make small changes - to turn off lights and computers - but it is more important to turn off our coal plants and off our drills into pristine natural refuges, at least in my book.

Lastly, her personal ties to the oil industry are at least as tight as those of George Bush - she’s married to them! Her husband works for British Petroleum, drilling in the northern areas of Alaska. I don’t think we can hold individuals accountable for their spouses mistakes (Hillary? Bill?), but Gov. Palin is currently embroiled in a scandal regarding her personal ethics, which makes me question what she will do for her family. She is being investigated for the allegation that Palin fired Alaska’s public safety commissioner because he would not fire Mike Wooten, an Alaskan state trooper who also happens to be Gov, Palin’s ex brother in law, after a messy divorce from Palin’s sister.

On the plus side, she and McCain still do have no chance for election overall. However, John McCain’s energy stance, at least, in more progressive than that of his new running mate. A Salon article in late 2007 described John McCain’s energy policy in great detail, interviewing him about 80 percent by 2050 and international carbon targets. It begins by saying:

John McCain likes to project a tough-guy stance on the issues, and global warming is no exception. “Americans solve problems. We don’t run from them,” he’s quoted as saying on the environment page of his Web site, which goes on to argue that “ignoring the problem reflects a ‘liberal, live for today’ attitude unworthy of our great country.”McCain has earned the right to put his own conservative spin on the fight against climate change. The first high-profile Republican to start talking seriously about the issue, he has called President Bush’s approach to global warming “disgraceful.” He cosponsored the first Senate bill calling for mandatory greenhouse-gas reductions, the 2003 McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act, and has pushed a number of versions of the bill in years since.

I would never vote for the John McCain and Sarah Palin regardless of the massive changes in her approach to energy policy and climate change that she will have to make to be elected as a vice president, but I am shocked that even McCain would select a candidate with such an awful environmental record or stance with regards to our nations’ biological, energetic, and climatic strategies. More and more voters are considering climate change as a major part of their candidate’s election platform and I think that these points will be some of the most important choices in the decision for the nation’s next president.

Cross-posted from 350.org…

My body is beginning to re-adjust to the appropriate time zone after returning to our 350.org office here in Burlington, Vermont, USA from India just 2 days ago. It is overwhelming to reflect on all that I did and learned in India for August while meeting with partners and allies across the country. The movement to fight climate change is now growing to new levels in India with exciting potential for changing the course of local, national, and international action on this crisis. This new growth is only just in the nick of time.

It’s incredibly sad to read reports of the floods in Eastern Nepal and the state of Bihar in northeastern India. As a result of unforgiving monsoon rains, a dam burst in Nepal 11 days ago, and now the Kosi river flowing from Nepal into Bihar breached its banks and changed course, pouring into hundreds of villages and towns. The death toll from floods and well as water-borne disease is rising day by day, and ultimately millions of people are being affected.

What’s worse is that India is no stranger to such disasters. Being in India this month I heard numerous personal tales of floods that are hard to conceive. Most memorable perhaps are the 2006 floods in Mumbai where nearly a meter (37.1 inches) of rain feel in a 24 period. While I was fortunate to not get caught up in anything on that scale, the stories became all that more real for me as I wintessed streets of Hyderabad turned into rivers in some sections of the city earlier in the month. All these floods are compounded by imperfect human development — urbanization without appropriate drainage, dams unable to contain the monsoon rains. Yet, the severity and frequency of these floods is being linked by many to the changing climate of South Asia as a result of global warming — it’s hard to build cities capable of withstanding a meter of rain in 24 hours.   

And it’s not just floods. In meetings with groups all around India I heard news of countless environmental changes and problems facing communities and the country right now. Even beyond the many local pollution and environmental degradation issues, they spoke of floods, droughts, rising sea levels, unpredictable seasonal changes making farming both difficult and stressful, and much more.
All in all, it makes sense to people in India that climate change is real and happening now. Even if learning about the concept of global warming for the first time, their experience often tells people that something is going seriously wrong.

The reality that Indians — and we could easily use the example of any number of countries around the world — are now facing the impacts of climate change while the planet heats up with 387 ppm co2 in the atmostphere makes it quite clear that we’re above where we want to be with respect to climate change. The news that we’re beyond the safe upper limit of co2 in the atmosphere makes perfect sense in this context. And thus, just about everyone I met in India agreed, setting 350 as the benchmark for international action is a must.

If the world is going to reach 350, then India needs not only to demand action and support from the main global warming culprits, the US and European nations, but they too will have to take a leadership role in modeling how to improve the lives of millions without endangering the planet. India will certainly have increasing energy demands as they attempt to provide electricity and improved standards of living to millions of people now living in poverty. The same vision now carrying forward the green jobs movement in the US is now rising at the grassroots level in India. Echoing the words of Van Jones, the movement to reach 350 is also a movement to create a “green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty.”

And so, it’s not only the flood waters of Bihar changing course. The movement to fight climate change and set the world on course to 350 is now strengthing in India as well. The Climate Project India, the Indian Youth Climate Network, the Centre for Social Markets, the Center for Environmental Education India, Sactuary Asia, and many many more are all increasing their efforts to rally the Indian people to take on climate change, including spreading 350. Much of their energy is starting with the need for basic education on the subject of global warming, but they are swiftly moving folks from education to action as well. It’s inspiring and a real renewal of hope to see the new course taking shape in the Indian climate movement, 350 now among the unifying themes.

In the end, this movement is never about any one country — not India, not China, not the US. It’s about uniting all countries and catalyzing global cooperation to achieve the common goal of 350 through the most fair means possible.

Carl Pope, Executive Director of the Sierra Club, said on a “Politics of Green” panel discussion this week in Denver that climate policy aimed at increasing energy bills is critically flawed:

“I actually think if we deal with global warming in a way which raises people’s energy bills, we will have blown it.“

You can watch it here.

Pope’s comment was a major shift away from the traditional approach on climate legislation taken by environmentalists. For years, the dominant climate strategy has been to educate Americans on the climate crisis, persuade the public to accept higher fossil fuel prices, and pass federal legislation to set a mandatory cap on carbon and allow the price to rise as high as necessary to achieve deep emissions reductions.

Pope’s comment represents a larger awakening among environmentalists to the realities of energy and global warming politics. The events of this summer - including the third failure of federal cap and trade legislation, eroding support in Congress, rapidly escalating oil prices, and a political beat-down of Democrats by Republicans on new oil drilling - have served as a watershed for the climate movement. In a nutshell, one thing above all else has become clear: climate policy aimed at significantly increasing energy costs will fail. Period.

So thank you, Carl, for the clear-eyed honesty about the flaws of carbon pricing. I hope your message is heard far and wide among environmentalists. It is absolutely critical that the green group not to let its prior obsessions with carbon pricing get in the way of a pragmatic, investment, and technology-centered approach. My generation simply cannot afford another policy failure next year.

With that said, Carl, I disagree with your implication that we can simply capture energy efficiency first and wait for new technologies. You said:

“McKinsey says roughly the first half of what we have to do is a good investment, and when you make a good investment [in efficiency] your bills don’t go up. Now the second half is going to be tougher, but hopefully by that time we will have new technology.”

Hopefully by what time? We can’t wait for efficiency to kick in before we make massive investments in clean energy technology, infrastructure, and education. Make no mistake: we should do everything we can to capture the efficiency you so compellingly describe. But we also need public investments of at least $50 billion per year to support everything from new transmission lines, the transition to electric vehicles, the creation of new battery technologies, and a National Energy Education Act, to a whole range of technologies and approaches to make clean energy cheap and abundant.

So I ask you to join us, Carl, in our effort to get the next Congress and administration to make these investments. If we can agree on the reality of energy and climate politics, we can agree on the solutions we need to transform our energy systems and the way we use our energy. It’s time to set aside our differences and work together to solve this crisis and secure our future.

We all know that most “old” businesses are a lot more risky than the new green ones. That’s the beauty of a green jobs economy! But while a whole lot of our generation has woken up to the fact that it actually is better for the economy and the environment to be innovative and rely on alternative, efficient energies and climate conscious systems, a whole lot of people are still asleep. Too many investors, banks, and shareholders don’t realize that their choices to continue to support coal-fired power plants and internal combustion engines in our cars will actually lose them money - and force us to lose our climate.

But now that XCel Energy, one of the biggest energy players in New York, is being forced to disclose the risks it is imposing silently on its shareholders, a lot more people may recognize the truth we already know. Mr. Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General of New York, subpoenaed four of the nation’s largest energy companies to disclose the risks that climate change poses to its business and its shareholders, including potential drought limiting the amount of water available for thermal power plants and rising sea levels. More importantly, they will also have to release how the coal and natural gas plants they are proposing also had risks of their own - in addition to creating more climate change - like future lawsuits or increased costs down the line based on carbon taxation or other carbon regulation.

NY Times quoted Mr. Cuomo saying, “This landmark agreement sets a new industrywide precedent that will force companies to disclose the true financial risks that climate change poses to their investors. Coal-fired power plants can significantly contribute to global warming, and investors have the right to know all the associated risks.”

When investors realize that the biggest risk to our planet and our pocketbooks is investing in old, dirty technologies, and that investing in innovation is no longer the biggest risk, I think they’ll all wake up to see the future beauty of a green economy.