Beginning this week, you'll start seeing my name in your inbox, attached to Progress Michigan emails.

That's because I've joined the fabulous team here at Progress Michigan as a Communications Specialist.

Who am I? I'm a lot of things: poet, mother, reporter, dog whisperer, amateur Iron Chef, rabid Tigers fan and activist.

My special skills – you've got it, communication – lend themselves particularly well to imparting to you, dear progressive friends, the importance of the issues we're working on.

Right now, they include energy. And jobs. And the economy. And global warming.

Seems pretty unrelated, right? Wrong. The U.S. Senate introduced a clean energy plan designed to combat global warming by capping dangerous greenhouse gas emissions and reducing our dependence on dirty coal plants and foreign oil. By offering incentives for energy efficiency and new, clean power technologies like wind turbines and solar panels, we can actually reduce our dependence on foreign oil and Big Oil companies, while creating an entire new industry here in Michigan. In fact, research shows that investing in clean energy will create 54,000 jobs in the next two years.

We're working hard to reenergize Michigan by making our great, mitten-shaped state a leader in 21st century energy technology. I'm excited to be able to tell my young one, and eventually her young ones, what it was like to watch as Michigan was reinvented from car-state to Great Green State.

I'm glad we'll be making it all happen together.

cross-posted at ClimateLaws.org

Under the neo-classic pen name, Justinian, several yet to be revealed policy and climate experts have released a blueprint of strategies for the incoming administration to consider with regards to climate change.  The lynchpin of these tactics is that they can all be undertaken without the need for immediate congressional action.  Like the Roman Emperor Justinian’s attempts to bring Rome out of the Dark Ages with, among other things, a complete revision of the Roman law code – the authors’ proposals offer a dramatic administrative shift in US priorities for climate change.

While some of the recommendations are fairly well known, some are wonkish administrative priority setting such as strategies within federal agencies that will permit a far greater amount of environmental policy changes to successfully navigate the myriad of interagency hurdles they often face.  Two of the more public and well known recommendations include having the US join a binding international agreement on climate change, and granting California’s exemption to EPA regulation of auto emissions essentially letting that state and 18 others raise emissions standards on automobiles. 

Some other suggestions include....more after the jump

 

The Sierra Club will be launching our Clean Up Dynegy Campaign on Feb. 20th with a nationwide call-in day to Dynegy Headquarters.

We did a trial run of a call-in day a few weeks ago and generated over 2,000 calls with over 200 coming from Michigan. With your help we hope to double that number this Wednesday.

Dynegy is the largest developer of new coal-fired power plants in the country. It has six plants proposed including one in Midland that, if built, will pour over 44 million tons of global warming pollution into our air each year. With your help, we can stop Dynegy's dirty coal plant plans and shift those investments into cleaner alternatives like wind, solar, and efficiency.

Our goal is to shine a bright spotlight on Dynegy's plans and put pressure on their executives to:

- Stop developing new coal.

- Increase efficiency and renewable energy alternatives through joint ventures and further investment, especially in wind and solar

- Follow the lead of other companies across the U.S. who have found that switching to clean energy can be good for our communities and for their bottom line.

- Make the best investment for its ratepayers--efficiency and renewable energy

Calling is simple, takes just a minute, and, when coupled with thousands of calls from around the country, makes a huge difference!

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HERE'S WHAT TO DO!

On February 20th:

CALL 713-767-5800 and ask for David Byford, Director of Public Relations and say:

"Hi there, My name is ____ from ____. I am calling to urge Dynegy to look beyond coal to cleaner energy solutions, like efficiency and renewables. Please pass my concerns on to the senior management of the company"

You can add any additional comments you like such as "efficiency and renewables can meet our energy needs while fighting global warming and creating jobs" or why you care about this issue.

You can also call Dynegy headquarters at 877-396-3499

After you've made the call, ask your friends, family and coworkers to do the same.

Then PLEASE MAKE SURE TO LET US KNOW HOW MANY CALLS YOU WERE GENERATED - we need to know how many calls were made and what the response was - PLEASE E-MAIL ME AT at rob@greencorps.org



Have questions? Email rob@greencorps.org