PERHAPS WASHINGTON IS A NEW CITY TODAY. SO, LET'S STOP COAL

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Washington DC feels like a new city today.

I live here, and I've never seen anything like this.  This morning, as the caravans of tour buses departed and the confetti was swept off the streets, I couldn't help but ask: what now?
In his inaugural address, President Obama said: "Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin the work of remaking America."

Remaking America.  Exactly.

So here's the question: what is the most effective thing that we can do, in this movement to solve the climate crisis, to help remake America?

I've been thinking about this for weeks, and I've come up with a few answers:
1) Join the effort to "Power Past Coal"
Starting TODAY, you can join a new effort we've partnered with called Power Past Coal.  They're leading the charge with a campaign against America's biggest--and dirtiest--fuel source.  Their 100 Days campaign ends on April 30th--until then, people all over the country are taking action in their communities.  You can register a new event or join an existing effort near you.  http://powerpastcoal.org/

Why coal? Because if we want to have any chance of reaching the safe level of 350 ppm of C02 in the atmosphere, we need to stop building polluting coal fired power plants.  Which leads me to #2...
2) Come to DC on March 2nd for an act of MASSIVE Civil Disobedience
Have you received the invitation from Bill McKibben yet? I've included it below this e-mail, but let me summarize: if you can come to Washington DC on March 2nd, please do.  For students and young people, that's the weekend of PowerShift '09 --the biggest national conference for the youth climate movement.

On March 2nd, we're helping to pull together a large act of civil disobedience outside of the coal-fired Capitol Power Plant that powers our federal government buildings.  Our act of civil disobedience will be carried out in the spirit of the Civil Rights movement--the same movement that made Obama's election a possibility.

As President Obama begins the long-delayed fight against global warming, he's going to need all of us helping him create the political space in which he can work. He's said that we need to keep our movement going strong--this will be a day to get across the most basic fact about climate change: coal is bad.

It will be a peaceful, dignified demonstration--and it won't work if we don't have the numbers.  Please join us.

3) Get Ready--2009 will be the year of Climate Action.

You heard it here first: this will be the year that the climate movement breaks into the mainstream.  We've got big plans for how to influence world leaders as they gear up to finalize a global climate treaty, and we'll soon be launching a new ACTION SET HERE IN UTAH and with it a batch of new organizing tools, strategies, materials, and more. We'll make sure you hear about it when we do but until then, start thinking about what it will take to pull together climate action in our community.

I couldn't be more excited to be entering this new era with all of you. 

Let's make it count,

ATLAS AND THE WHOLE UTAH NO COAL TEAM

P.S. I've included the letter from Bill McKibben and Wendell Berry below--please pass it along to anyone who you think might be interested in a taking a stand for a safe future.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Bill McKibben
Date: Mon, Jan 20, 2009 at 4:45 PM
Subject: Stand with me against coal.
To: Phil Aroneanu
There are moments in a nation's--and a planet's--history when it may be necessary for some to break the law in order to bear witness to an evil, bring it to wider attention, and push for its correction. We think such a time has arrived, and we are writing to say that we hope some of you will join us in Washington D.C. on Monday March 2 in order to take part in a civil act of civil disobedience outside a coal-fired power plant near Capitol Hill.

We will be there to make several points:

- Coal-fired power is driving climate change. Our foremost climatologist, NASA's James Hansen, has demonstrated that our only hope of getting our atmosphere back to a safe level--below 350 parts per million co2--lies in stopping the use of coal to generate electricity.

- Even if climate change were not the urgent crisis that it is, we would still be burning our fossil fuels too fast, wasting too much energy and releasing too much poison into the air and water. We would still need to slow down, and to restore thrift to its old place as an economic virtue.

- Coal is filthy at its source. Much of the coal used in this country comes from West Virginia and Kentucky, where companies engage in "mountaintop removal" to get at the stuff; they leave behind a leveled wasteland, and impoverished human communities. No technology better exemplifies the out-of-control relationship between humans and the rest of creation.

- Coal smoke makes children sick. Asthma rates in urban areas near coal-fired power plants are high. Air pollution from burning coal is harmful to the health of grown-ups too, and to the health of everything that breathes, including forests.

The industry claim that there is something called "clean coal" is, put simply, a lie. But it's a lie told with tens of millions of dollars, which we do not have. We have our bodies, and we are willing to use them to make our point. We don't come to such a step lightly. We have written and testified and organized politically to make this point for many years, and while in recent months there has been real progress against new coal-fired power plants, the daily business of providing half our electricity from coal continues unabated. It's time to make clear that we can't safely run this planet on coal at all. So we feel the time has come to do more--we hear President Barack Obama's call for a movement for change that continues past election day, and we hear Nobel Laureate Al Gore's call for creative non-violence outside coal plants. As part of the international negotiations now underway on global warming, our nation will be asking China, India, and others to limit their use of coal in the future to help save the planet's atmosphere. This is a hard thing to ask, because it's their cheapest fuel. Part of our witness in March will be to say that we're willing to make some sacrifices ourselves, even if it's only a trip to the jail.

With any luck, this will be the largest such protest yet, large enough that it may provide a real spark. If you want to participate with us, you need to go through a short course of non-violence training. This will be, to the extent it depends on us, an entirely peaceful demonstration, carried out in a spirit of hope and not rancor. We will be there in our dress clothes, and ask the same of you. There will be young people, people from faith communities, people from the coal fields of Appalachia, and from the neighborhoods in Washington that get to breathe the smoke from the plant.

We will cross the legal boundary of the power plant, and we expect to be arrested. After that we have no certainty what will happen, but lawyers and such will be on hand. Our goal is not to shut the plant down for the day--it is but one of many, and anyway its operation for a day is not the point. The worldwide daily reliance on coal is the danger; this is one small step to raise awareness of that ruinous habit and hence help to break it.

Needless to say, we're not handling the logistics of this day. All the credit goes to a variety of groups, especially EnergyAction (which is bringing thousands of young people to Washington that weekend), Greenpeace, the Ruckus Society, and Rainforest Action Network.

Please join us for this historic day--sign up by clicking here: http://www.capitolclimateaction.com/?page_id=11
Thank you,

Wendell Berry, Bill McKibben

P.S.--This is important: Please forward this letter to anyone and everyone you think might be interested.