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Posts with the tag al gore
Al, I am sorry that you still buy into a centralized electrical energy system. It is disappointing when someone with such good intentions, education, and voice still advocates for big utilities and corporations instead of a real solution. Why did you limit your comments to a 100 by 100 mile photovoltaic collection site? Especially, when you pointed out one of its fatal flaws, transmission to the sites of use. By the way. another fatal flaw is that this approach leaves us at the mercy of the utility companies.
A better solution is to promote the incorporation of photovoltaic collectors into building materials such as: siding and roofing. This technology exists today and could be substituted for conventional shingles, metal roofing, and aluminum siding. In essence, every building in the world could help to solve the energy problem. How much electricity could we generate if installed this technology on every building in and around Atlanta, New York City, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Dallas, etc? Generating electricity at the site of use in this way nearly eliminates the need for long distance transmission.
Wind can be added simply to this system using small sinusoidal wind turbines, about 6 feet in size, that can be mounted on roofs and on the sides of skyscrapers. These turbines are not susceptible to damage by high wind like the mega turbines. They look more like ornamental wind mobiles and don't have the aesthetic obstacles that large wind farms have. They are relatively cheap and can help bridge the gap during low sunlight.
Yes, we need a smart grid. We do need to transmit excess electricity to industry and areas experiencing low production. What we don't need is the means of production in a few corporate hands remotely located away from the areas of use. We need to require that the grid buy the excess electrical production at fair market price like they do from conventional generators. We need a system for powering long distance travel on our roads using electric vehicles. My suggestion for this is a system using short distance wireless electricity transmission built into the interstate highway system based on Tesla's proposal at the turn of the last century. Cars and cargo haulers would run off this system saving their batteries for local roads. A device like EasyPass could track their energy usage.
I am disappointed that Al and this site seem to be so set on centralized renewable energy instead of a small "d" democratic approach. The sun shines everywhere. The wind blows everywhere. Geothermal energy radiates out from the earths core everywhere. Why limit ourselves to isolated areas of use? Why maintain our dependence on the whims of large corporations? Why continue the insecurity of our economic stability on the good intentions of the same corporate executives that got us into the current crisis out of greed? Let's push for a real long term solution to these issues.
A better solution is to promote the incorporation of photovoltaic collectors into building materials such as: siding and roofing. This technology exists today and could be substituted for conventional shingles, metal roofing, and aluminum siding. In essence, every building in the world could help to solve the energy problem. How much electricity could we generate if installed this technology on every building in and around Atlanta, New York City, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Dallas, etc? Generating electricity at the site of use in this way nearly eliminates the need for long distance transmission.
Wind can be added simply to this system using small sinusoidal wind turbines, about 6 feet in size, that can be mounted on roofs and on the sides of skyscrapers. These turbines are not susceptible to damage by high wind like the mega turbines. They look more like ornamental wind mobiles and don't have the aesthetic obstacles that large wind farms have. They are relatively cheap and can help bridge the gap during low sunlight.
Yes, we need a smart grid. We do need to transmit excess electricity to industry and areas experiencing low production. What we don't need is the means of production in a few corporate hands remotely located away from the areas of use. We need to require that the grid buy the excess electrical production at fair market price like they do from conventional generators. We need a system for powering long distance travel on our roads using electric vehicles. My suggestion for this is a system using short distance wireless electricity transmission built into the interstate highway system based on Tesla's proposal at the turn of the last century. Cars and cargo haulers would run off this system saving their batteries for local roads. A device like EasyPass could track their energy usage.
I am disappointed that Al and this site seem to be so set on centralized renewable energy instead of a small "d" democratic approach. The sun shines everywhere. The wind blows everywhere. Geothermal energy radiates out from the earths core everywhere. Why limit ourselves to isolated areas of use? Why maintain our dependence on the whims of large corporations? Why continue the insecurity of our economic stability on the good intentions of the same corporate executives that got us into the current crisis out of greed? Let's push for a real long term solution to these issues.
Al, I am sorry that you still buy into a centralized electrical energy system. It is disappointing when someone with such good intentions, education, and voice still advocates for big utilities and corporations instead of a real solution. Why did you limit your comments to a 100 by 100 mile photovoltaic collection site? Especially, when you pointed out one of its fatal flaws, transmission to the sites of use. By the way. another fatal flaw is that this approach leaves us at the mercy of the utility companies.
A better solution is to promote the incorporation of photovoltaic collectors into building materials such as: siding and roofing. This technology exists today and could be substituted for conventional shingles, metal roofing, and aluminum siding. In essence, every building in the world could help to solve the energy problem. How much electricity could we generate if installed this technology on every building in and around Atlanta, New York City, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Dallas, etc? Generating electricity at the site of use in this way nearly eliminates the need for long distance transmission.
Wind can be added simply to this system using small sinusoidal wind turbines, about 6 feet in size, that can be mounted on roofs and on the sides of skyscrapers. These turbines are not susceptible to damage by high wind like the mega turbines. They look more like ornamental wind mobiles and don't have the aesthetic obstacles that large wind farms have. They are relatively cheap and can help bridge the gap during low sunlight.
Yes, we need a smart grid. We do need to transmit excess electricity to industry and areas experiencing low production. What we don't need is the means of production in a few corporate hands remotely located away from the areas of use. We need to require that the grid buy the excess electrical production at fair market price like they do from conventional generators. We need a system for powering long distance travel on our roads using electric vehicles. My suggestion for this is a system using short distance wireless electricity transmission built into the interstate highway system based on Tesla's proposal at the turn of the last century. Cars and cargo haulers would run off this system saving their batteries for local roads. A device like EasyPass could track their energy usage.
I am disappointed that Al and this site seem to be so set on centralized renewable energy instead of a small "d" democratic approach. The sun shines everywhere. The wind blows everywhere. Geothermal energy radiates out from the earths core everywhere. Why limit ourselves to isolated areas of use? Why maintain our dependence on the whims of large corporations? Why continue the insecurity of our economic stability on the good intentions of the same corporate executives that got us into the current crisis out of greed? Let's push for a real long term solution to these issues.
A better solution is to promote the incorporation of photovoltaic collectors into building materials such as: siding and roofing. This technology exists today and could be substituted for conventional shingles, metal roofing, and aluminum siding. In essence, every building in the world could help to solve the energy problem. How much electricity could we generate if installed this technology on every building in and around Atlanta, New York City, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Dallas, etc? Generating electricity at the site of use in this way nearly eliminates the need for long distance transmission.
Wind can be added simply to this system using small sinusoidal wind turbines, about 6 feet in size, that can be mounted on roofs and on the sides of skyscrapers. These turbines are not susceptible to damage by high wind like the mega turbines. They look more like ornamental wind mobiles and don't have the aesthetic obstacles that large wind farms have. They are relatively cheap and can help bridge the gap during low sunlight.
Yes, we need a smart grid. We do need to transmit excess electricity to industry and areas experiencing low production. What we don't need is the means of production in a few corporate hands remotely located away from the areas of use. We need to require that the grid buy the excess electrical production at fair market price like they do from conventional generators. We need a system for powering long distance travel on our roads using electric vehicles. My suggestion for this is a system using short distance wireless electricity transmission built into the interstate highway system based on Tesla's proposal at the turn of the last century. Cars and cargo haulers would run off this system saving their batteries for local roads. A device like EasyPass could track their energy usage.
I am disappointed that Al and this site seem to be so set on centralized renewable energy instead of a small "d" democratic approach. The sun shines everywhere. The wind blows everywhere. Geothermal energy radiates out from the earths core everywhere. Why limit ourselves to isolated areas of use? Why maintain our dependence on the whims of large corporations? Why continue the insecurity of our economic stability on the good intentions of the same corporate executives that got us into the current crisis out of greed? Let's push for a real long term solution to these issues.
CALL TO ACTION: SUPPORT THE PRO ENVIRONMENTAL TICKET OF OBAMA-BIDEN
On this blog you’ll find many articles on how hemp can remove the excess CO2 from our atmosphere, the cause of global warming. This article deals with one of the effects that could be reversed if we would just stop living by the rules of dead people and remove government restrictions from nature, starting with the hemp plant.
The governor of Alaska and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is leading the state that is suing the US Fish & Wildlife Service for their decision to protect polar bears by putting them on the endangered species list.
The new Vice Presidential candidate, with less than two years experience as governor of the state of Alaska, with ties to big oil, Sarah Palin said regarding the matter:
“We believe that the Service’s decision to list the polar bear was not based on the best scientific and commercial data available.”
Yes, her idea of opposing the Bush Administration is to take a stand against the little they are doing for the environment, since it's in the way of big oil.
As Al Gore pointed out years ago in his film An Inconvenient Truth, all honest scientists are saying that global warming is in process, polar bears are dying now from the experience, and the rest of us are in danger too.Below is the link to the press release about how Palin's Alaska’s does not want polar bears on the endangered species list.
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2008/polar-bear-08-05-2008.html
For Immediate Release, August 5, 2008
Contact: Kassie Siegel, Center for Biological Diversity, (760) 366-2232 x 302 or (951) 961-7972, ksiegel@biologicaldiversity.org Josh Mogerman, NRDC, (312) 780-7424 or (773) 531-5359 Jane Kochersperger, Greenpeace, (202) 319-2493 or (202) 680-3798
Statement of the Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, and Natural Resources Defense Council on the State of Alaska's
Lawsuit to Overturn Endangered Species Act Protection for the Polar Bear WASHINGTON— The state of Alaska has filed a lawsuit in federal district court (District of Columbia) challenging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision to list the polar bear as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act due to global warming.Statement of Kassie Siegel, climate program director at the Center for Biological Diversity, and lead author of the 2005 petition to list the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act:“The State of Alaska’s challenge to the protection of the polar bear is a lost cause based on discredited, industry-funded attacks on science. This case has no merit, and the Center for Biological Diversity, NRDC, and Greenpeace will be seeking to intervene in the lawsuit and have it dismissed.”Statement of Andrew Wetzler, director, NRDC Endangered Species Project:“The state of Alaska's response is disappointing, but certainly no surprise. They have taken their cues from industry every step of the way.”Statement of Melanie Duchin, global warming campaigner at Greenpeace USA:“Alaska is on the front line of global warming impacts, and the polar bear is our canary in the coal mine. The state's lawsuit isn’t about the science of global warming and polar bears – it is merely doing the bidding of oil companies that want to drill for oil in sensitive polar bear habitat, without any concern for how that oil will impact the climate when it's burned.”# # #The Center for Biological Diversity is a nonprofit conservation organization with more than 180,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places. www.biologicaldiversity.orgGreenpeace is an independent campaigning organization with 2.7 million members worldwide that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions for the future. www.greenpeace.org The Natural Resources Defense Council is a national, nonprofit organization of scientists, lawyers and environmental specialists dedicated to protecting public health and the environment. Founded in 1970, NRDC has 1.2 million members and online activists, served from offices in New York, Washington, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Beijing. www.nrdc.org
Please vote Obama-Biden ’08 www.barackobama.com. Now more than ever, change we can believe in.
For more information on how we can use hemp to save ourselves from the ravages of global warming, visit the USA Hemp Museum, www.hempmuseum.org, a private museum with a virtual wing. The museum's founder, Richard M. Davis has a great book called HEMP FOR VICTORY: A GLOBAL WARMING SOLUTION.
Read More »Wow, I'm mightily heartened to see so much response on the email list today. When I first started the group the list email function wasn't working, so I think I kinda walked away for a bit, but glad there is other interest building. Thanks to Ryan and everyone who took the time to respond for kicking it into gear.
Anyone coming to wecansolveit these days is cruising thru a welcome page that has links to Al Gore's recent Energy Challenge speech and there's also a wonderful video with snips from the speech set to music with great graphics. Stop and take a look if you haven't seen it already.
I think the biggest individual changes we can make are in the kitchen (local sourced organic as possible foods, read Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan), home energy efficiency (see Kilowatt Hours, if anybody hasn't, borrow it from me), and on the road ( I just got Who Killed the Electric Car from netflix and should be watching it right now!). But by far our biggest job is making sure there is political will for making these tremendous changes happen on a national and global policy level asap. Take a look at a project like www.ausra.com and see what we can do on a large scale with renewable enrgy. It's mind boggling that there is still so much foot dragging going on. It's going to take all of us and more at home, at work, at church, school and everywhere.
Yes we can! ~m
Anyone coming to wecansolveit these days is cruising thru a welcome page that has links to Al Gore's recent Energy Challenge speech and there's also a wonderful video with snips from the speech set to music with great graphics. Stop and take a look if you haven't seen it already.
I think the biggest individual changes we can make are in the kitchen (local sourced organic as possible foods, read Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan), home energy efficiency (see Kilowatt Hours, if anybody hasn't, borrow it from me), and on the road ( I just got Who Killed the Electric Car from netflix and should be watching it right now!). But by far our biggest job is making sure there is political will for making these tremendous changes happen on a national and global policy level asap. Take a look at a project like www.ausra.com and see what we can do on a large scale with renewable enrgy. It's mind boggling that there is still so much foot dragging going on. It's going to take all of us and more at home, at work, at church, school and everywhere.
Yes we can! ~m
Alright, I guess I'll kick off this first post with a bit of an introduction. I'm a 23 year old animator currently living in Atlanta, GA. I've always been a big fan of open source, and recently I'm starting to see how it could be used to help us transform our world quickly and efficiently. I think open source is a mature enough concept that it's ready to move out of the world of software development and into the realm of the physical.
Over at Worldchanging.com. Alex Steffen just posted a passoinate piece critiquing Al Gore's challenge. Alex's main point is that focusing just on renewable energy might not be enough. While I have to say I believe it's a bit more of a 'lynchpin issue' than Alex gives it credit for, I agree absolutely with him that there are a myriad of problems which all need solving, and quick. This is why I think I'm so optimistic about the potential of open source. Open source, could do to the next generation of city planning, energy and transportation technology, and a spectrum of others what the printing press did for literature. One great thing about open source is its modular nature. Groups form around problems of common interest and find a solution optimized to solve it. The result is then freely shared, creating a network of optimized solutions waiting to be woven together into something magnificent. Take Linux as a prime example. There is no one person who sat down and wrote every bit of a Linux distro from the most basic driver up to the GUI polish. Different groups of interested people worked seperately yet in concert with one another to create the components which could be remixed and utilized at will, ultimately being combined into larger projects. Imagine a open source city block using open source building designs, using open source green technology, and connected together using a open source public transportation systems replicated across the world. As a lump sum it looks like a impossible goal, but in components and with proper foresight and collaboration, each of these could be easily tackled by groups of interested in each specific area.
For more cool musings on open source, I point you to Yochai Benkler.
Read More »Trying to figure how to concisely get across the almost bittersweet sense I get watching Al Gore address the annual TED conference. He speaks of a 'generational mission', an obligation and an opportunity. We have taken for granted all this planet had and has to offer, and we've gone a long way towards ruining it forever. In the eleventh hour, there's still a chance to turn it all around. "Every passing moment is another chance to turn it all around"
Yeah, life's busy. We make it that way, maybe on purpose. Maybe that way we won't have to focus on the stuff that matters. "We have a culture of distraction"
I guess I'll rip this right off the website - I want to stay informed. I want to show my support. I want to be part of the solution.
"We can do this! Don't tell me that we don't have the capacity to do it. If we had just one week's worth of what we spend on the Iraq war, we could be well on the way to solving this challenge. We have the capacity to do it." - Al Gore
Yeah, life's busy. We make it that way, maybe on purpose. Maybe that way we won't have to focus on the stuff that matters. "We have a culture of distraction"
I guess I'll rip this right off the website - I want to stay informed. I want to show my support. I want to be part of the solution.
"We can do this! Don't tell me that we don't have the capacity to do it. If we had just one week's worth of what we spend on the Iraq war, we could be well on the way to solving this challenge. We have the capacity to do it." - Al Gore
Wow! I can't believe I've made the personal decision to get involved. This is such a big step - and we all should do it! I love Bowling Green and Kentucky is my home away from home. I'm only able to get back home as often as I would like because I'm the pilot of Al Gore's private aircraft and my journey's take me far from home many times.
I don't mind being away because Al 'the doughboy' Gore gives me a stipend based on the charitable donations coming through his accounts. I asked if he was giving it away to charities, and he replied - "All of it! To Mine!". Talk about money! He calls the cash in his wallet a carbon and pays for hookers and calls it a credit. Wow! I never thought of it this way. With his respect for women and calling it credits, I say push ahead with this and let us all get credits!
I don't mind being away because Al 'the doughboy' Gore gives me a stipend based on the charitable donations coming through his accounts. I asked if he was giving it away to charities, and he replied - "All of it! To Mine!". Talk about money! He calls the cash in his wallet a carbon and pays for hookers and calls it a credit. Wow! I never thought of it this way. With his respect for women and calling it credits, I say push ahead with this and let us all get credits!
I have been running a small company through which Al Gore has been buying carbon credits from. Our growth has been phenominal of late, with his increasing aflluence in world politics. Special kudos to everyone who has been listening to this special profit!
Mr Gore's increasing private jet schedule has virtually depleted our ability to obtain additional carbon credits through government paperwork. In case you were not aware, we have been paying government agencies for an additional piece of paper attached via carbon paper at many agencies. While it may be harder to write through, we have been taking the carbon paper and the extra paperwork and sequestoring it in file cabinets or peoples homes.
If you are looking for part-time income as a carbon sequstor'r, please leave a post and we will have one of our agents contact you for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Don't let the opportunity of carbon credits pass you by!
Mr Gore's increasing private jet schedule has virtually depleted our ability to obtain additional carbon credits through government paperwork. In case you were not aware, we have been paying government agencies for an additional piece of paper attached via carbon paper at many agencies. While it may be harder to write through, we have been taking the carbon paper and the extra paperwork and sequestoring it in file cabinets or peoples homes.
If you are looking for part-time income as a carbon sequstor'r, please leave a post and we will have one of our agents contact you for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Don't let the opportunity of carbon credits pass you by!
Ok everybody, the ball is now rolling on getting our presidential candidates on the bandwagon for change! Demands for the Candidates has opened up shop as a group on WeCanSolveIt.org. I am very excited about the possibilities here.
So far there have been over 1.4 million members sign up on the We Campaign, all of them calling for change in our energy policies. Imagine now if we got some of those people calling for Obama and McCain to ramp up their energy policies or risk losing votes. Do you see what I see? I see both candidates scrambling to try and gain votes by doing exactly what I suggest and trying as hard as they can not to lose any votes by ignoring the issue.
We need to make this election revolve around one thing... climate change! And the only way we are possibly going to be able to do this is by using our power as individuals in a democracy, the power of the VOTE!
Let's send a message to the candidates telling them we demand, not want, but DEMAND that they pay attention to the millions of people out there wanting a shift in the way America works.
Join Demands for the Candidates and help me put some real pressure on those who want the White House.
Thanks,
Michael
So far there have been over 1.4 million members sign up on the We Campaign, all of them calling for change in our energy policies. Imagine now if we got some of those people calling for Obama and McCain to ramp up their energy policies or risk losing votes. Do you see what I see? I see both candidates scrambling to try and gain votes by doing exactly what I suggest and trying as hard as they can not to lose any votes by ignoring the issue.
We need to make this election revolve around one thing... climate change! And the only way we are possibly going to be able to do this is by using our power as individuals in a democracy, the power of the VOTE!
Let's send a message to the candidates telling them we demand, not want, but DEMAND that they pay attention to the millions of people out there wanting a shift in the way America works.
Join Demands for the Candidates and help me put some real pressure on those who want the White House.
Thanks,
Michael
My husband and I just sat down and watched to video of his challenge to America. My first thought is wow, why couldn't he have been that good of a speaker and persuader when he was running for office, he may have actually won.
My second thought is how right can one man be. We really have to stop what it is we are doing and seriously change how our economy works. Everything is falling apart at the same time, climate, economy. We need to make some serious changes if we want some serious results.
I for one am taking this very serious. I am learning what it is I can do in my community to help people understand what kind of impact it is we are having on our Earth and what we can do to make a difference. I hope that you, the lovely readers out there, are doing the same. Contact your local departments at the county courthouse, find out what types of programs are available in your area and where it is you can help to improve and get this challenge underway.
My second thought is how right can one man be. We really have to stop what it is we are doing and seriously change how our economy works. Everything is falling apart at the same time, climate, economy. We need to make some serious changes if we want some serious results.
I for one am taking this very serious. I am learning what it is I can do in my community to help people understand what kind of impact it is we are having on our Earth and what we can do to make a difference. I hope that you, the lovely readers out there, are doing the same. Contact your local departments at the county courthouse, find out what types of programs are available in your area and where it is you can help to improve and get this challenge underway.
CALL TO ACTION: ASK AL GORE TO INCLUDE THE EFFECTIVE TOOL, HEMP, TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM OF GLOBAL WARMING.
Vice President Gore, thank you and your crew for your brilliant speech about a 10 year challenge to solve our climate crisis. With a little bit of luck, we can get this done much sooner.
Not once did you mention the amazing hemp plant as part of your solution. It's time to stop pretending not to know that nature's solution to global warming and other problems includes the restoration of her hemp plant.
When the problem is too much CO2 in the air, the solution is to remove the excess CO2. Hemp is a master at removing excess CO2, yet, it's the illegal solution to environmental pollution.
Hemp can help heal our environment, economy and have a positive impact on our health.
WE HAVE MADE NATURE ILLEGAL AND WONDER WHY WE HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THE ENVIRONMENT. LET'S LEGALIZE NATURE AGAIN.
For more information on how hemp can help us solve our environmental problems, there is a research edition of the book HEMP FOR VICTORY: A GLOBAL WARMING SOLUTION by Richard M. Davis of the USA Hemp Museum, www.hempmuseum.org . The book is posted http://www.hempmuseum.org/H4V/H4VAGWS.pdf Read More »
Vice President Gore, thank you and your crew for your brilliant speech about a 10 year challenge to solve our climate crisis. With a little bit of luck, we can get this done much sooner.
Not once did you mention the amazing hemp plant as part of your solution. It's time to stop pretending not to know that nature's solution to global warming and other problems includes the restoration of her hemp plant.
When the problem is too much CO2 in the air, the solution is to remove the excess CO2. Hemp is a master at removing excess CO2, yet, it's the illegal solution to environmental pollution.
Hemp can help heal our environment, economy and have a positive impact on our health.
WE HAVE MADE NATURE ILLEGAL AND WONDER WHY WE HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THE ENVIRONMENT. LET'S LEGALIZE NATURE AGAIN.
For more information on how hemp can help us solve our environmental problems, there is a research edition of the book HEMP FOR VICTORY: A GLOBAL WARMING SOLUTION by Richard M. Davis of the USA Hemp Museum, www.hempmuseum.org . The book is posted http://www.hempmuseum.org/H4V/H4VAGWS.pdf Read More »
Al Gore: A Generational Challenge to Repower America
Ladies and gentlemen:
There are times in the history of our nation when our very way of life depends upon dispelling illusions and awakening to the challenge of a present danger. In such moments, we are called upon to move quickly and boldly to shake off complacency, throw aside old habits and rise, clear-eyed and alert, to the necessity of big changes. Those who, for whatever reason, refuse to do their part must either be persuaded to join the effort or asked to step aside. This is such a moment. The survival of the United States of America as we know it is at risk. And even more - if more should be required - the future of human civilization is at stake.
I don't remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously. Our economy is in terrible shape and getting worse, gasoline prices are increasing dramatically, and so are electricity rates. Jobs are being outsourced. Home mortgages are in trouble. Banks, automobile companies and other institutions we depend upon are under growing pressure. Distinguished senior business leaders are telling us that this is just the beginning unless we find the courage to make some major changes quickly.
The climate crisis, in particular, is getting a lot worse - much more quickly than predicted. Scientists with access to data from Navy submarines traversing underneath the North polar ice cap have warned that there is now a 75 percent chance that within five years the entire ice cap will completely disappear during the summer months. This will further increase the melting pressure on Greenland. According to experts, the Jakobshavn glacier, one of Greenland's largest, is moving at a faster rate than ever before, losing 20 million tons of ice every day, equivalent to the amount of water used every year by the residents of New York City.
Two major studies from military intelligence experts have warned our leaders about the dangerous national security implications of the climate crisis, including the possibility of hundreds of millions of climate refugees destabilizing nations around the world.
Just two days ago, 27 senior statesmen and retired military leaders warned of the national security threat from an "energy tsunami" that would be triggered by a loss of our access to foreign oil. Meanwhile, the war in Iraq continues, and now the war in Afghanistan appears to be getting worse.
And by the way, our weather sure is getting strange, isn't it? There seem to be more tornadoes than in living memory, longer droughts, bigger downpours and record floods. Unprecedented fires are burning in California and elsewhere in the American West. Higher temperatures lead to drier vegetation that makes kindling for mega-fires of the kind that have been raging in Canada, Greece, Russia, China, South America, Australia and Africa. Scientists in the Department of Geophysics and Planetary Science at Tel Aviv University tell us that for every one degree increase in temperature, lightning strikes will go up another 10 percent. And it is lightning, after all, that is principally responsible for igniting the conflagration in California today.
Like a lot of people, it seems to me that all these problems are bigger than any of the solutions that have thus far been proposed for them, and that's been worrying me.
I'm convinced that one reason we've seemed paralyzed in the face of these crises is our tendency to offer old solutions to each crisis separately - without taking the others into account. And these outdated proposals have not only been ineffective - they almost always make the other crises even worse.
Yet when we look at all three of these seemingly intractable challenges at the same time, we can see the common thread running through them, deeply ironic in its simplicity: our dangerous over-reliance on carbon-based fuels is at the core of all three of these challenges - the economic, environmental and national security crises.
We're borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that's got to change.
But if we grab hold of that common thread and pull it hard, all of these complex problems begin to unravel and we will find that we're holding the answer to all of them right in our hand.
The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels.
In my search for genuinely effective answers to the climate crisis, I have held a series of "solutions summits" with engineers, scientists, and CEOs. In those discussions, one thing has become abundantly clear: when you connect the dots, it turns out that the real solutions to the climate crisis are the very same measures needed to renew our economy and escape the trap of ever-rising energy prices. Moreover, they are also the very same solutions we need to guarantee our national security without having to go to war in the Persian Gulf.
What if we could use fuels that are not expensive, don't cause pollution and are abundantly available right here at home?
We have such fuels. Scientists have confirmed that enough solar energy falls on the surface of the earth every 40 minutes to meet 100 percent of the entire world's energy needs for a full year. Tapping just a small portion of this solar energy could provide all of the electricity America uses.
And enough wind power blows through the Midwest corridor every day to also meet 100 percent of US electricity demand. Geothermal energy, similarly, is capable of providing enormous supplies of electricity for America.
The quickest, cheapest and best way to start using all this renewable energy is in the production of electricity. In fact, we can start right now using solar power, wind power and geothermal power to make electricity for our homes and businesses.
But to make this exciting potential a reality, and truly solve our nation's problems, we need a new start.
That's why I'm proposing today a strategic initiative designed to free us from the crises that are holding us down and to regain control of our own destiny. It's not the only thing we need to do. But this strategic challenge is the lynchpin of a bold new strategy needed to re-power America.
Today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years.
This goal is achievable, affordable and transformative. It represents a challenge to all Americans - in every walk of life: to our political leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, engineers, and to every citizen.
A few years ago, it would not have been possible to issue such a challenge. But here's what's changed: the sharp cost reductions now beginning to take place in solar, wind, and geothermal power - coupled with the recent dramatic price increases for oil and coal - have radically changed the economics of energy.
When I first went to Congress 32 years ago, I listened to experts testify that if oil ever got to $35 a barrel, then renewable sources of energy would become competitive. Well, today, the price of oil is over $135 per barrel. And sure enough, billions of dollars of new investment are flowing into the development of concentrated solar thermal, photovoltaics, windmills, geothermal plants, and a variety of ingenious new ways to improve our efficiency and conserve presently wasted energy.
And as the demand for renewable energy grows, the costs will continue to fall. Let me give you one revealing example: the price of the specialized silicon used to make solar cells was recently as high as $300 per kilogram. But the newest contracts have prices as low as $50 a kilogram.
You know, the same thing happened with computer chips - also made out of silicon. The price paid for the same performance came down by 50 percent every 18 months - year after year, and that's what's happened for 40 years in a row.
To those who argue that we do not yet have the technology to accomplish these results with renewable energy: I ask them to come with me to meet the entrepreneurs who will drive this revolution. I've seen what they are doing and I have no doubt that we can meet this challenge.
To those who say the costs are still too high: I ask them to consider whether the costs of oil and coal will ever stop increasing if we keep relying on quickly depleting energy sources to feed a rapidly growing demand all around the world. When demand for oil and coal increases, their price goes up. When demand for solar cells increases, the price often comes down.
When we send money to foreign countries to buy nearly 70 percent of the oil we use every day, they build new skyscrapers and we lose jobs. When we spend that money building solar arrays and windmills, we build competitive industries and gain jobs here at home.
Of course there are those who will tell us this can't be done. Some of the voices we hear are the defenders of the status quo - the ones with a vested interest in perpetuating the current system, no matter how high a price the rest of us will have to pay. But even those who reap the profits of the carbon age have to recognize the inevitability of its demise. As one OPEC oil minister observed, "The Stone Age didn't end because of a shortage of stones."
To those who say 10 years is not enough time, I respectfully ask them to consider what the world's scientists are telling us about the risks we face if we don't act in 10 years. The leading experts predict that we have less than 10 years to make dramatic changes in our global warming pollution lest we lose our ability to ever recover from this environmental crisis. When the use of oil and coal goes up, pollution goes up. When the use of solar, wind and geothermal increases, pollution comes down.
To those who say the challenge is not politically viable: I suggest they go before the American people and try to defend the status quo. Then bear witness to the people's appetite for change.
I for one do not believe our country can withstand 10 more years of the status quo. Our families cannot stand 10 more years of gas price increases. Our workers cannot stand 10 more years of job losses and outsourcing of factories. Our economy cannot stand 10 more years of sending $2 billion every 24 hours to foreign countries for oil. And our soldiers and their families cannot take another 10 years of repeated troop deployments to dangerous regions that just happen to have large oil supplies.
What could we do instead for the next 10 years? What should we do during the next 10 years? Some of our greatest accomplishments as a nation have resulted from commitments to reach a goal that fell well beyond the next election: the Marshall Plan, Social Security, the interstate highway system. But a political promise to do something 40 years from now is universally ignored because everyone knows that it's meaningless. Ten years is about the maximum time that we as a nation can hold a steady aim and hit our target.
When President John F. Kennedy challenged our nation to land a man on the moon and bring him back safely in 10 years, many people doubted we could accomplish that goal. But 8 years and 2 months later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the surface of the moon.
To be sure, reaching the goal of 100 percent renewable and truly clean electricity within 10 years will require us to overcome many obstacles. At present, for example, we do not have a unified national grid that is sufficiently advanced to link the areas where the sun shines and the wind blows to the cities in the East and the West that need the electricity. Our national electric grid is critical infrastructure, as vital to the health and security of our economy as our highways and telecommunication networks. Today, our grids are antiquated, fragile, and vulnerable to cascading failure. Power outages and defects in the current grid system cost US businesses more than $120 billion dollars a year. It has to be upgraded anyway.
We could further increase the value and efficiency of a Unified National Grid by helping our struggling auto giants switch to the manufacture of plug-in electric cars. An electric vehicle fleet would sharply reduce the cost of driving a car, reduce pollution, and increase the flexibility of our electricity grid.
At the same time, of course, we need to greatly improve our commitment to efficiency and conservation. That's the best investment we can make.
America's transition to renewable energy sources must also include adequate provisions to assist those Americans who would unfairly face hardship. For example, we must recognize those who have toiled in dangerous conditions to bring us our present energy supply. We should guarantee good jobs in the fresh air and sunshine for any coal miner displaced by impacts on the coal industry. Every single one of them.
Of course, we could and should speed up this transition by insisting that the price of carbon-based energy include the costs of the environmental damage it causes. I have long supported a sharp reduction in payroll taxes with the difference made up in CO2 taxes. We should tax what we burn, not what we earn. This is the single most important policy change we can make.
In order to foster international cooperation, it is also essential that the United States rejoin the global community and lead efforts to secure an international treaty at Copenhagen in December of next year that includes a cap on CO2 emissions and a global partnership that recognizes the necessity of addressing the threats of extreme poverty and disease as part of the world's agenda for solving the climate crisis.
Of course the greatest obstacle to meeting the challenge of 100 percent renewable electricity in 10 years may be the deep dysfunction of our politics and our self-governing system as it exists today. In recent years, our politics has tended toward incremental proposals made up of small policies designed to avoid offending special interests, alternating with occasional baby steps in the right direction. Our democracy has become sclerotic at a time when these crises require boldness.
It is only a truly dysfunctional system that would buy into the perverse logic that the short-term answer to high gasoline prices is drilling for more oil ten years from now.
Am I the only one who finds it strange that our government so often adopts a so-called solution that has absolutely nothing to do with the problem it is supposed to address? When people rightly complain about higher gasoline prices, we propose to give more money to the oil companies and pretend that they're going to bring gasoline prices down. It will do nothing of the sort, and everyone knows it. If we keep going back to the same policies that have never ever worked in the past and have served only to produce the highest gasoline prices in history alongside the greatest oil company profits in history, nobody should be surprised if we get the same result over and over again. But the Congress may be poised to move in that direction anyway because some of them are being stampeded by lobbyists for special interests that know how to make the system work for them instead of the American people.
If you want to know the truth about gasoline prices, here it is: the exploding demand for oil, especially in places like China, is overwhelming the rate of new discoveries by so much that oil prices are almost certain to continue upward over time no matter what the oil companies promise. And politicians cannot bring gasoline prices down in the short term.
However, there actually is one extremely effective way to bring the costs of driving a car way down within a few short years. The way to bring gas prices down is to end our dependence on oil and use the renewable sources that can give us the equivalent of $1 per gallon gasoline.
Many Americans have begun to wonder whether or not we've simply lost our appetite for bold policy solutions. And folks who claim to know how our system works these days have told us we might as well forget about our political system doing anything bold, especially if it is contrary to the wishes of special interests. And I've got to admit, that sure seems to be the way things have been going. But I've begun to hear different voices in this country from people who are not only tired of baby steps and special interest politics, but are hungry for a new, different and bold approach.
We are on the eve of a presidential election. We are in the midst of an international climate treaty process that will conclude its work before the end of the first year of the new president's term. It is a great error to say that the United States must wait for others to join us in this matter. In fact, we must move first, because that is the key to getting others to follow; and because moving first is in our own national interest.
So I ask you to join with me to call on every candidate, at every level, to accept this challenge - for America to be running on 100 percent zero-carbon electricity in 10 years. It's time for us to move beyond empty rhetoric. We need to act now.
This is a generational moment. A moment when we decide our own path and our collective fate. I'm asking you - each of you - to join me and build this future. Please join the WE campaign at wecansolveit.org.We need you. And we need you now. We're committed to changing not just light bulbs, but laws. And laws will only change with leadership.
On July 16, 1969, the United States of America was finally ready to meet President Kennedy's challenge of landing Americans on the moon. I will never forget standing beside my father a few miles from the launch site, waiting for the giant Saturn 5 rocket to lift Apollo 11 into the sky. I was a young man, 21 years old, who had graduated from college a month before and was enlisting in the United States Army three weeks later.
I will never forget the inspiration of those minutes. The power and the vibration of the giant rocket's engines shook my entire body. As I watched the rocket rise, slowly at first and then with great speed, the sound was deafening. We craned our necks to follow its path until we were looking straight up into the air. And then four days later, I watched along with hundreds of millions of others around the world as Neil Armstrong took one small step to the surface of the moon and changed the history of the human race.
We must now lift our nation to reach another goal that will change history. Our entire civilization depends upon us now embarking on a new journey of exploration and discovery. Our success depends on our willingness as a people to undertake this journey and to complete it within 10 years. Once again, we have an opportunity to take a giant leap for humankind.
Ladies and gentlemen:
There are times in the history of our nation when our very way of life depends upon dispelling illusions and awakening to the challenge of a present danger. In such moments, we are called upon to move quickly and boldly to shake off complacency, throw aside old habits and rise, clear-eyed and alert, to the necessity of big changes. Those who, for whatever reason, refuse to do their part must either be persuaded to join the effort or asked to step aside. This is such a moment. The survival of the United States of America as we know it is at risk. And even more - if more should be required - the future of human civilization is at stake.
I don't remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously. Our economy is in terrible shape and getting worse, gasoline prices are increasing dramatically, and so are electricity rates. Jobs are being outsourced. Home mortgages are in trouble. Banks, automobile companies and other institutions we depend upon are under growing pressure. Distinguished senior business leaders are telling us that this is just the beginning unless we find the courage to make some major changes quickly.
The climate crisis, in particular, is getting a lot worse - much more quickly than predicted. Scientists with access to data from Navy submarines traversing underneath the North polar ice cap have warned that there is now a 75 percent chance that within five years the entire ice cap will completely disappear during the summer months. This will further increase the melting pressure on Greenland. According to experts, the Jakobshavn glacier, one of Greenland's largest, is moving at a faster rate than ever before, losing 20 million tons of ice every day, equivalent to the amount of water used every year by the residents of New York City.
Two major studies from military intelligence experts have warned our leaders about the dangerous national security implications of the climate crisis, including the possibility of hundreds of millions of climate refugees destabilizing nations around the world.
Just two days ago, 27 senior statesmen and retired military leaders warned of the national security threat from an "energy tsunami" that would be triggered by a loss of our access to foreign oil. Meanwhile, the war in Iraq continues, and now the war in Afghanistan appears to be getting worse.
And by the way, our weather sure is getting strange, isn't it? There seem to be more tornadoes than in living memory, longer droughts, bigger downpours and record floods. Unprecedented fires are burning in California and elsewhere in the American West. Higher temperatures lead to drier vegetation that makes kindling for mega-fires of the kind that have been raging in Canada, Greece, Russia, China, South America, Australia and Africa. Scientists in the Department of Geophysics and Planetary Science at Tel Aviv University tell us that for every one degree increase in temperature, lightning strikes will go up another 10 percent. And it is lightning, after all, that is principally responsible for igniting the conflagration in California today.
Like a lot of people, it seems to me that all these problems are bigger than any of the solutions that have thus far been proposed for them, and that's been worrying me.
I'm convinced that one reason we've seemed paralyzed in the face of these crises is our tendency to offer old solutions to each crisis separately - without taking the others into account. And these outdated proposals have not only been ineffective - they almost always make the other crises even worse.
Yet when we look at all three of these seemingly intractable challenges at the same time, we can see the common thread running through them, deeply ironic in its simplicity: our dangerous over-reliance on carbon-based fuels is at the core of all three of these challenges - the economic, environmental and national security crises.
We're borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that's got to change.
But if we grab hold of that common thread and pull it hard, all of these complex problems begin to unravel and we will find that we're holding the answer to all of them right in our hand.
The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels.
In my search for genuinely effective answers to the climate crisis, I have held a series of "solutions summits" with engineers, scientists, and CEOs. In those discussions, one thing has become abundantly clear: when you connect the dots, it turns out that the real solutions to the climate crisis are the very same measures needed to renew our economy and escape the trap of ever-rising energy prices. Moreover, they are also the very same solutions we need to guarantee our national security without having to go to war in the Persian Gulf.
What if we could use fuels that are not expensive, don't cause pollution and are abundantly available right here at home?
We have such fuels. Scientists have confirmed that enough solar energy falls on the surface of the earth every 40 minutes to meet 100 percent of the entire world's energy needs for a full year. Tapping just a small portion of this solar energy could provide all of the electricity America uses.
And enough wind power blows through the Midwest corridor every day to also meet 100 percent of US electricity demand. Geothermal energy, similarly, is capable of providing enormous supplies of electricity for America.
The quickest, cheapest and best way to start using all this renewable energy is in the production of electricity. In fact, we can start right now using solar power, wind power and geothermal power to make electricity for our homes and businesses.
But to make this exciting potential a reality, and truly solve our nation's problems, we need a new start.
That's why I'm proposing today a strategic initiative designed to free us from the crises that are holding us down and to regain control of our own destiny. It's not the only thing we need to do. But this strategic challenge is the lynchpin of a bold new strategy needed to re-power America.
Today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years.
This goal is achievable, affordable and transformative. It represents a challenge to all Americans - in every walk of life: to our political leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, engineers, and to every citizen.
A few years ago, it would not have been possible to issue such a challenge. But here's what's changed: the sharp cost reductions now beginning to take place in solar, wind, and geothermal power - coupled with the recent dramatic price increases for oil and coal - have radically changed the economics of energy.
When I first went to Congress 32 years ago, I listened to experts testify that if oil ever got to $35 a barrel, then renewable sources of energy would become competitive. Well, today, the price of oil is over $135 per barrel. And sure enough, billions of dollars of new investment are flowing into the development of concentrated solar thermal, photovoltaics, windmills, geothermal plants, and a variety of ingenious new ways to improve our efficiency and conserve presently wasted energy.
And as the demand for renewable energy grows, the costs will continue to fall. Let me give you one revealing example: the price of the specialized silicon used to make solar cells was recently as high as $300 per kilogram. But the newest contracts have prices as low as $50 a kilogram.
You know, the same thing happened with computer chips - also made out of silicon. The price paid for the same performance came down by 50 percent every 18 months - year after year, and that's what's happened for 40 years in a row.
To those who argue that we do not yet have the technology to accomplish these results with renewable energy: I ask them to come with me to meet the entrepreneurs who will drive this revolution. I've seen what they are doing and I have no doubt that we can meet this challenge.
To those who say the costs are still too high: I ask them to consider whether the costs of oil and coal will ever stop increasing if we keep relying on quickly depleting energy sources to feed a rapidly growing demand all around the world. When demand for oil and coal increases, their price goes up. When demand for solar cells increases, the price often comes down.
When we send money to foreign countries to buy nearly 70 percent of the oil we use every day, they build new skyscrapers and we lose jobs. When we spend that money building solar arrays and windmills, we build competitive industries and gain jobs here at home.
Of course there are those who will tell us this can't be done. Some of the voices we hear are the defenders of the status quo - the ones with a vested interest in perpetuating the current system, no matter how high a price the rest of us will have to pay. But even those who reap the profits of the carbon age have to recognize the inevitability of its demise. As one OPEC oil minister observed, "The Stone Age didn't end because of a shortage of stones."
To those who say 10 years is not enough time, I respectfully ask them to consider what the world's scientists are telling us about the risks we face if we don't act in 10 years. The leading experts predict that we have less than 10 years to make dramatic changes in our global warming pollution lest we lose our ability to ever recover from this environmental crisis. When the use of oil and coal goes up, pollution goes up. When the use of solar, wind and geothermal increases, pollution comes down.
To those who say the challenge is not politically viable: I suggest they go before the American people and try to defend the status quo. Then bear witness to the people's appetite for change.
I for one do not believe our country can withstand 10 more years of the status quo. Our families cannot stand 10 more years of gas price increases. Our workers cannot stand 10 more years of job losses and outsourcing of factories. Our economy cannot stand 10 more years of sending $2 billion every 24 hours to foreign countries for oil. And our soldiers and their families cannot take another 10 years of repeated troop deployments to dangerous regions that just happen to have large oil supplies.
What could we do instead for the next 10 years? What should we do during the next 10 years? Some of our greatest accomplishments as a nation have resulted from commitments to reach a goal that fell well beyond the next election: the Marshall Plan, Social Security, the interstate highway system. But a political promise to do something 40 years from now is universally ignored because everyone knows that it's meaningless. Ten years is about the maximum time that we as a nation can hold a steady aim and hit our target.
When President John F. Kennedy challenged our nation to land a man on the moon and bring him back safely in 10 years, many people doubted we could accomplish that goal. But 8 years and 2 months later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the surface of the moon.
To be sure, reaching the goal of 100 percent renewable and truly clean electricity within 10 years will require us to overcome many obstacles. At present, for example, we do not have a unified national grid that is sufficiently advanced to link the areas where the sun shines and the wind blows to the cities in the East and the West that need the electricity. Our national electric grid is critical infrastructure, as vital to the health and security of our economy as our highways and telecommunication networks. Today, our grids are antiquated, fragile, and vulnerable to cascading failure. Power outages and defects in the current grid system cost US businesses more than $120 billion dollars a year. It has to be upgraded anyway.
We could further increase the value and efficiency of a Unified National Grid by helping our struggling auto giants switch to the manufacture of plug-in electric cars. An electric vehicle fleet would sharply reduce the cost of driving a car, reduce pollution, and increase the flexibility of our electricity grid.
At the same time, of course, we need to greatly improve our commitment to efficiency and conservation. That's the best investment we can make.
America's transition to renewable energy sources must also include adequate provisions to assist those Americans who would unfairly face hardship. For example, we must recognize those who have toiled in dangerous conditions to bring us our present energy supply. We should guarantee good jobs in the fresh air and sunshine for any coal miner displaced by impacts on the coal industry. Every single one of them.
Of course, we could and should speed up this transition by insisting that the price of carbon-based energy include the costs of the environmental damage it causes. I have long supported a sharp reduction in payroll taxes with the difference made up in CO2 taxes. We should tax what we burn, not what we earn. This is the single most important policy change we can make.
In order to foster international cooperation, it is also essential that the United States rejoin the global community and lead efforts to secure an international treaty at Copenhagen in December of next year that includes a cap on CO2 emissions and a global partnership that recognizes the necessity of addressing the threats of extreme poverty and disease as part of the world's agenda for solving the climate crisis.
Of course the greatest obstacle to meeting the challenge of 100 percent renewable electricity in 10 years may be the deep dysfunction of our politics and our self-governing system as it exists today. In recent years, our politics has tended toward incremental proposals made up of small policies designed to avoid offending special interests, alternating with occasional baby steps in the right direction. Our democracy has become sclerotic at a time when these crises require boldness.
It is only a truly dysfunctional system that would buy into the perverse logic that the short-term answer to high gasoline prices is drilling for more oil ten years from now.
Am I the only one who finds it strange that our government so often adopts a so-called solution that has absolutely nothing to do with the problem it is supposed to address? When people rightly complain about higher gasoline prices, we propose to give more money to the oil companies and pretend that they're going to bring gasoline prices down. It will do nothing of the sort, and everyone knows it. If we keep going back to the same policies that have never ever worked in the past and have served only to produce the highest gasoline prices in history alongside the greatest oil company profits in history, nobody should be surprised if we get the same result over and over again. But the Congress may be poised to move in that direction anyway because some of them are being stampeded by lobbyists for special interests that know how to make the system work for them instead of the American people.
If you want to know the truth about gasoline prices, here it is: the exploding demand for oil, especially in places like China, is overwhelming the rate of new discoveries by so much that oil prices are almost certain to continue upward over time no matter what the oil companies promise. And politicians cannot bring gasoline prices down in the short term.
However, there actually is one extremely effective way to bring the costs of driving a car way down within a few short years. The way to bring gas prices down is to end our dependence on oil and use the renewable sources that can give us the equivalent of $1 per gallon gasoline.
Many Americans have begun to wonder whether or not we've simply lost our appetite for bold policy solutions. And folks who claim to know how our system works these days have told us we might as well forget about our political system doing anything bold, especially if it is contrary to the wishes of special interests. And I've got to admit, that sure seems to be the way things have been going. But I've begun to hear different voices in this country from people who are not only tired of baby steps and special interest politics, but are hungry for a new, different and bold approach.
We are on the eve of a presidential election. We are in the midst of an international climate treaty process that will conclude its work before the end of the first year of the new president's term. It is a great error to say that the United States must wait for others to join us in this matter. In fact, we must move first, because that is the key to getting others to follow; and because moving first is in our own national interest.
So I ask you to join with me to call on every candidate, at every level, to accept this challenge - for America to be running on 100 percent zero-carbon electricity in 10 years. It's time for us to move beyond empty rhetoric. We need to act now.
This is a generational moment. A moment when we decide our own path and our collective fate. I'm asking you - each of you - to join me and build this future. Please join the WE campaign at wecansolveit.org.We need you. And we need you now. We're committed to changing not just light bulbs, but laws. And laws will only change with leadership.
On July 16, 1969, the United States of America was finally ready to meet President Kennedy's challenge of landing Americans on the moon. I will never forget standing beside my father a few miles from the launch site, waiting for the giant Saturn 5 rocket to lift Apollo 11 into the sky. I was a young man, 21 years old, who had graduated from college a month before and was enlisting in the United States Army three weeks later.
I will never forget the inspiration of those minutes. The power and the vibration of the giant rocket's engines shook my entire body. As I watched the rocket rise, slowly at first and then with great speed, the sound was deafening. We craned our necks to follow its path until we were looking straight up into the air. And then four days later, I watched along with hundreds of millions of others around the world as Neil Armstrong took one small step to the surface of the moon and changed the history of the human race.
We must now lift our nation to reach another goal that will change history. Our entire civilization depends upon us now embarking on a new journey of exploration and discovery. Our success depends on our willingness as a people to undertake this journey and to complete it within 10 years. Once again, we have an opportunity to take a giant leap for humankind.
Another historic night in the solving of Global warming.
Al Gore announced his support for Barack Obama today, and a tear fell from my eyes.
Senator Obama has proposed solutions that will work. His early sponsorship of an Industrial Hemp act would help pull the excess CO2 from the atmosphere at it grows. For more information on how hemp can help us heal ourselves and our planet visit the USA Hemp Museum, www.hempmuseum.org.
I urge all environmentalists to support Barack Obama.
He is our best hope for positive, constructive change.
We are the United States of America, and it's our responsibility to work with the rest of the world to make this planet a better, safer and more blessed planet than we've been in the past.
Yes we can!!! Read More »
Al Gore announced his support for Barack Obama today, and a tear fell from my eyes.
Senator Obama has proposed solutions that will work. His early sponsorship of an Industrial Hemp act would help pull the excess CO2 from the atmosphere at it grows. For more information on how hemp can help us heal ourselves and our planet visit the USA Hemp Museum, www.hempmuseum.org.
I urge all environmentalists to support Barack Obama.
He is our best hope for positive, constructive change.
We are the United States of America, and it's our responsibility to work with the rest of the world to make this planet a better, safer and more blessed planet than we've been in the past.
Yes we can!!! Read More »
It is nice to know that, in this climate of financial change - where markets are tumbling, shares are crumbling, and currencies are stumbling - some things carry on as they always have done.
Well, I say 'nice'.
The annual meeting of shareholders of Exxon Mobil occurred Wednesday, and they seemingly have promised to change their ways. Yet through all their announcements and past their public statements about their intentions and hopes, they continue to pursue policies that damage our environment and kill our planet. They have been canny in being able to shield it from us - funding research into 'green options', making the short-term PR problem go away, and creating a façade that 'they want to change how they operate'. Read More »
Well, I say 'nice'.
The annual meeting of shareholders of Exxon Mobil occurred Wednesday, and they seemingly have promised to change their ways. Yet through all their announcements and past their public statements about their intentions and hopes, they continue to pursue policies that damage our environment and kill our planet. They have been canny in being able to shield it from us - funding research into 'green options', making the short-term PR problem go away, and creating a façade that 'they want to change how they operate'. Read More »
Due to Al Gore's phony science of "global warming" and such, America has an ongoing campaign against the rising temperatures of the world and how it may effect us in the future. Sadly, though, you are all being deceived. Global warming is not something that can be cured. You cannot inject the economy with "green" products and reduced pollutants to save the world, as this warming trend is irreversible.
Green products are definitely environmentally friendly, however, so no offense to green product makers. I support the effort to HELP the environment (I care for the furry little animals just as much as the next guy, and keeping around foilage for oxygen is definitely a plus). But human activity has not thrown the world into a spinning orbit of doom, as these warming trends have lead to ice ages 4 times before, and only ONE of those times has there ever been human life on the planet. I doubt "cavemen" had gas-guzzling Hummers and threw away more paper than used.
If this is so, you may be wondering why Al Gore is promoting low energy, low flow, green products. One word to fit the capitalist society motif: Money. Did you know he gets percentages of YOUR money every time you buy an approved green product? And for someone who is promoting this garbage "science," you would think he would follow his own word:
When asked if he too would cut his energy usage in his own home, Mr. Gore flatly refused.
Yet people still buy into global warming.
Facts:
Last winter was one of the coldest experienced for the northern region of the United States.
In the 70's, the world was concerned with "global cooling." (What a switch.)
The hurricane activity in the tropics actually FELL from previous years (Blame the Japanese mafia for stealing the Russian weather machine).
It's essential that Americans are informed that global warming cannot be reverse. The holes in the ozone layer cannot be reformed with more ozone! Extinct species cannot magically appear out of a rabbit's hole! The environment cannot be saved after years of chemical abuse. The only thing we can do it change our behavior, and wait out this trend of weather changes. If we enter into another ice age, big deal! The human species didn't die out during the last one, and even the cavemen, with their innovative fire and cave paintings, stuck it out to reach 2008. Read More »
Green products are definitely environmentally friendly, however, so no offense to green product makers. I support the effort to HELP the environment (I care for the furry little animals just as much as the next guy, and keeping around foilage for oxygen is definitely a plus). But human activity has not thrown the world into a spinning orbit of doom, as these warming trends have lead to ice ages 4 times before, and only ONE of those times has there ever been human life on the planet. I doubt "cavemen" had gas-guzzling Hummers and threw away more paper than used.
If this is so, you may be wondering why Al Gore is promoting low energy, low flow, green products. One word to fit the capitalist society motif: Money. Did you know he gets percentages of YOUR money every time you buy an approved green product? And for someone who is promoting this garbage "science," you would think he would follow his own word:
When asked if he too would cut his energy usage in his own home, Mr. Gore flatly refused.
Yet people still buy into global warming.
Facts:
Last winter was one of the coldest experienced for the northern region of the United States.
In the 70's, the world was concerned with "global cooling." (What a switch.)
The hurricane activity in the tropics actually FELL from previous years (Blame the Japanese mafia for stealing the Russian weather machine).
It's essential that Americans are informed that global warming cannot be reverse. The holes in the ozone layer cannot be reformed with more ozone! Extinct species cannot magically appear out of a rabbit's hole! The environment cannot be saved after years of chemical abuse. The only thing we can do it change our behavior, and wait out this trend of weather changes. If we enter into another ice age, big deal! The human species didn't die out during the last one, and even the cavemen, with their innovative fire and cave paintings, stuck it out to reach 2008. Read More »
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