what we’re doing – Page 11 – Climate Action Alliance of the Valley

August 14, 2015

RGGI Resolution for Harrisonburg

CAAV and our partners are working to support a City of Harrisonburg council resolution in favor of Virginia joining the states north of us in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). This places a value on clean power and efficiency. Charlottesville’s city council just passed a resolution–we’d love to see Harrisonburg do the same!

We encourage you to reach out to your council members in favor of RGGI to speed up action on the resolution and help us make a difference in Virginia’s energy policy!

Council members contact information for residents of Harrisonburg and a sample email message for them is below:

• Mayor Chris Jones: christopher.jones[at]harrisonburgva.gov
• Vice Mayor Baugh: richard.baugh[at]harrisonburgva.gov
• Council Member Degner: kai.degner[at]harrisonburgva.gov
• Council Member Shearer: abe.shearer[at]harrisonburgva.gov
• Council Member Byrd: ted.byrd[at]harrisonburgva.gov

A sample email could look something like this:

“Dear [Councilmember],

I am a resident of Harrisonburg, Va. I’m contacting you because the Harrisonburg City Council has the opportunity to join other cities in taking the lead on climate policy in an easy and meaningful way that builds on energy efforts in our city. I am writing in favor of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI)—a collaborative effort among nine states designed to reduce carbon pollution in the most cost-effective manner.

Since the program was formed in 2008, RGGI states from Maine to Maryland reduced their carbon footprint 2.5 times faster than non-RGGI states. Electricity prices in RGGI states have dropped on average by 8% while prices throughout the rest of the nation increased 6% during the same time period. In experience, the RGGI program has proven to be effective.

Locally, a growing group of residential, commercial and university solar and wind power installations are generating electricity with renewable power in the city. Virginia’s joining RGGI would benefit Harrisonburg and bring further value to our city efforts while reducing our climate impacts.

Furthermore, RGGI would generate approximately $200 million per year through an energy market to invest in clean energy and energy efficiency projects statewide, including projects in Harrisonburg, while providing adaptation measures for climate-change-related flooding, and economic development.

I’m urging you to support the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative as it is introduced on the local and state level as part of our state’s climate action plan. Harrisonburg can take this important step to help lead the way toward a clean energy future.

Thank you,

[your name]
[your address]

Thank you for engaging with this issue and playing an important role in the groundwork of this initiative. Please contact kendallk@chesapeakeclimate.org with any questions!

More about RGGI, the Virginia Coastal Protection Act and the Chesapeake Climate Action Network’s Safe Coast Virginia campaign here.

June 30, 2015

Pope on Climate Change with Laura Dansby on WHSV, June 2015

CAAV Chair Laura Dansby was interviewed by WHSV’s Bob Corso on June 20, 2015 shortly after Pope Francis’s release of his encyclical on climate change. Click on the image above to view 1on1: Pope on Climate Change.

May 29, 2015

Merchants of Doubt at CST June 2nd

The Climate Action Alliance of the Valley (CAAV) has been working hard to bring this great film to Harrisonburg so we need to fill up the theater. Bring your skeptical friends and relations, bring people who are not aware of climate change, bring everyone you know. Share this post with your email lists.

Merchants of Doubt at Court Square Theater!
The Climate Action Alliance of the Valley, Visulite Cinemas and the Arts Council of the Valley are partnering to host a showing of Merchants of Doubt, on Tuesday June 2nd at 7 pm. The film Merchants of Doubt is a documentary based on the book of the same name by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Coway first published in 2010. It looks at pundits-for-hire who present themselves as scientific authorities, whose services are bought and paid for by corporations, think tanks and other special interests to cast doubt and delay public and governmental action on climate change.

A Question and Answer session will be held in Court Square Theater after the film, moderated by Les Grady (CAAV) and with a panel that includes Doug Hendren and Bishop Dansby.

What: Merchants of Doubt showing plus Q and A
When: Tuesday June 2nd at 7pm
Where: Downtown Harrisonburg’s Court Square Theater
Cost: $9.50 Adult / $8.50 Senior, Student

You can buy tickets online here or at the door before the show.

Court Square Theater is located at 41-F Court Square in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8ii9zGFDtc&w=560&h=315]

THOM POWERS on Merchants of Doubt, the film
Toronto International Film Festival

Documentarian Robert Kenner (Food, Inc.) investigates the shadowy world of professional skeptics, whose services are bought and paid for by corporations, think tanks and other special interests to cast doubt and delay public and governmental action on climate change.

“I’m not a scientist, but I play one on TV,” says Marc Morano, a man frequently cited as a specialist on climate change. Merchants of Doubt explores the shadowy world of purported experts who stake claims contrary to scientific consensus. Their efforts have spread confusion and delayed action over cigarettes and toxic chemicals. Now their main battleground is denying the man-made causes of climate change.

Director Robert Kenner previously investigated how corporations affect what we eat in his breakthrough documentary Food, Inc. Here he reveals how corporations affect what we think. He traces the birth of the doubt industry to the 1950s, when tobacco companies began fighting the perception that cigarettes are harmful. Those efforts succeeded for decades, and have been replicated as a model for climate-change denial.

A vast majority of legitimate scientists warn that we can’t afford to delay action any longer. So what drives the merchants of doubt: is it money, ideology, or both? Kenner profiles key climate skeptics, uncovering their credentials and motivations. He shows how they navigate the media, think tanks, and government circles. He interviews scientists such as James Hansen, who raised a prominent alarm about global warming in the 1980s only to see his work attacked. “Most scientists are not good communicators,” Hansen concedes.

Kenner also introduces us to figures who have crossed the political divide, such as Republican Congressman Bob Inglis from South Carolina. Inglis originally thought climate change was “hooey,” but reversed that opinion after deeper research. The fact that the Congressman now considers the environment a “moral issue” proves that other minds can change too.

May 15, 2015

Wisdom to Survive

Climate change is taking place. Will we have the wisdom to survive? The film features thought leaders and activists in the realms of science, economics and spirituality. The focus: how we can live creatively and even joyfully in the face of this catastrophe. Because they are doing the work that needs to be done, they inspire the viewer to want to join the “team.”

Featured in the film: Bill McKibben, Joanna Macy, Gus Speth, Roger Payne, & more!

This film is deeply moving and profoundly engaging. Indeed, it has the potential to transform lives because it provides visions of how we should live in the midst of massive environmental challenges. I cannot recommend it more highly! – Mary Evelyn Tucker, Forum on Religion & Ecology at Yale

Please join the Climate Action Alliance of the Valley for two community showings of this film on Tuesday, June 9, 2015, at Harrisonburg’s downtown library, 174 S. Main St., at 3:00PM and 6:00PM. These screenings are part of “the 1st ever Valley DocFilmFest.” The film is just under an hour long. Please stay for a discussion about it after each screening.

Click on this image to find the movie trailer:

May 9, 2015

“On the Chopping Block” with Brian Bellew

Please join the Climate Action Alliance of the Valley for a public presentation by Friends of Blackwater Climate Outreach Coordinator Brian Bellew: “On the Chopping Block: Climate Change and the Allegheny Highlands – What’s at Stake, What’s at Risk, and What Are Our Choices?”

Tuesday, May 19, 6:00 PM, Massanutten Regional Library, 174 S. Main St., Harrisonburg

The Allegheny Highlands includes on its eastern edge Virginia’s Shenandoah National Park – and the magnificent Monongahela and George Washington National Forests, and much more. For generations, an intricate web of life based on the Highlands’ high-mountain climate has been central to the region’s vibrant forestry, agricultural, recreation, and hospitality economy.

But we can no longer take the Allegheny Highlands’ historic climate for granted.
Climate change impacts are already affecting temperatures, precipitation, weather, growing seasons, streams, forests, plants, animals and humans – and future impacts will be severe, unless global warming is reined in.

Today, the distinctive Highlands ecology and economy — that have enriched so many generations of residents and visitors — are “on the chopping block.”

Brian Bellew, staffer with Friends of Blackwater, an environmental and conservation organization headquartered in Davis, W.V., will present a program that highlights the scientific research that was presented at a June 2014 conference at Blackwater Falls State Park featuring a dozen experts.

Les Grady, Climate Action Alliance of the Valley member, will also talk about the effects of climate change on our bird population.

Contact Joni Grady at 540-209-9198 for more information.

Friends of Blackwater is a non-profit conservation organization working effectively in the Mid-Atlantic Appalachian Highlands with a mission to protect key landscapes and watersheds, natural and human communities, and to support economic development that maximizes biodiversity and outdoor recreational opportunities for future generations.

The Highlands region straddles the Appalachians’ highest peaks — including parts of Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, and Virginia. Hundreds of thousands of people live and work in the Highlands, and each year thousands of visitors come to enjoy the distinctive highmountain climate. But unless the pace of global warming and climate change is slowed, the future of the ecology and economy that have enriched so many generations of residents and visitors is on the chopping block.

Friends of Blackwater is leading an Allegheny Highlands Climate Change Impacts Initiative highlighting the growing, dangerous impacts and risks from global warming and climate change to the Highlands’ economy and ecology.

Friends of Blackwater Climate Outreach Coordinator Brian Bellew is doing community presentations about their new Report, “On the Chopping Block – the Impacts of Climate Change on the Mid-Atlantic Allegheny Highlands.” You can read and download a copy of the Report here.

April 29, 2015

Free Weatherization

If you qualify* as a low-to-moderate income household, Community Housing Partners can help reduce your energy bills and make your home more comfortable, energy efficient and affordable year round.

Clients approved for the Weatherization Assistance Program will receive a FREE ENERGY AUDIT, which will determine the work that can be done to your home. This may Include:

Energy-Saving measures to reduce heat loss, such as attic and wall insulation, caulking and weather-stripping
Inspection of heating equipment and duct work in order to assure safe and efficient operation
Assessment and remedy of unsafe conditions (carbon monoxide emissions, back-draft conditions, fire hazards, bad wiring etc.)
Other energy-related improvements

To learn more or obtain an application, please contact:

Karen Vincent 540-949-5879 x 5108

Community Housing Partners/ Energy Solutions
126 S. Bayard Ave., Waynesboro, VA 22980

Meghan McMillen mmcmillen[at]chpc2.org

www.communityhousingpartners.org

More here through the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development website.

Pass it on, to family and friends!

* Weatherization Assistance Program income eligibility levels are here: Weatherization Income Limits

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Please consider printing out flyers to hang on your area bulletin boards or to give to anyone who may be interested: CHP half page flyer in English or half page flyer in Spanish

April 9, 2015

Celebrate & Renew on Earth Day 2015

Thanks to Lee and everyone who joined us to honor this Earth Day 2015.

Here is Kelsey Erickson’s video Lee played but which got cut off a bit early:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJY2kuoMgzY]

See photos from the event below.

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Wed., April 22
5:30-7:15 PM
MRL
174 S. Main St.
Harrisonburg

Climate Action Alliance of the Valley invites you to join a 35th anniversary celebration of Earth Day at Massanutten Regional Library in downtown Harrisonburg!

We’ll have:

live music
refreshments
nature readings
special guest speaker, Lee Stewart, from the Great March for Climate Action.

Lee will share his experiences walking across the U.S. from Los Angeles to Washington DC last year in order to bring awareness of the challenge of climate change. We’ll also find out how this journey has inspired his current work with Beyond Extreme Energy and Loudoun 350.org.

All welcome! Free and open to the public. Bring your friends and family!

After our library program, we’ll continue the party at Ruby’s Lounge, 153 S. Main St., across the street from the library, to socialize, visit with Lee and find out more about Beyond Extreme Energy and how we can support them with their work.

In January 2014, Climate Action Alliance of the Valley collaborated with iMatter Kids vs. Global Warming, JMU Mahatma Gandhi Center for Global Nonviolence, and the Shenandoah Group of the Sierra Club to throw a Party for Climate Action which succeeded in raising over $2300 for Lee (Jerry) Stewart to help send him on his cross country trek raising awareness for climate change issues.

See the Daily News-Record article: ‘Extraordinary Action’: Climate Alliance To Host Events April 22 In Celebration Of Earth Day, by Hannah Pitstick, published on April 21, 2015.

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March 4, 2015

I Am One Of The Alarmed

Daily News-Record (Harrisonburg, VA); March 3, 2015
Open Forum
Leslie Grady, Jr.

Americans can be divided into six groups, depending on their concern about climate change, ranging from the Alarmed to the Dismissive. I belong to The Alarmed.

I am an engineer. For more than 40 years I taught, conducted research, and published in engineering and science journals. I also was a consultant to major chemical companies and was employed by a large environmental engineering consulting firm. So how can I be among the Alarmed?

The birth of our granddaughter in 2005 focused my attention on global warming because I realized that if the scientists were right, she would experience significant human-caused climate change during her lifetime. To educate myself I first read two books, both written by scientists, that summarized the state of climate science. Then I began to read papers from the scientific literature, as well as additional books and documents prepared by expert groups convened by the National Academy of Sciences and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

I have a sound layman’s understanding of climate science. That understanding convinces me that humanity faces dire problems if we do not move rapidly and efficiently to limit atmospheric emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuels. Since we are currently doing little, yes, I am alarmed.

An important finding in the latest IPCC report is that Earth’s warming is directly proportional to the total amount of fossil fuel-derived CO2 put into the atmosphere. This sets an upper limit on the CO2 we can emit while staying within a given degree of warming, i.e., it sets a CO2 budget. Governments worldwide have agreed to limit global warming to 3.6 degrees. At the current rate of CO2 emissions, the budget associated with that limit will be reached in around 25 years, a very short time within which to make major changes in our energy economy. This is another cause for my alarm.

If we immediately start significantly reducing our emission rate we extend the time before the limit is reached. PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that if we cut our emissions per unit of GDP by 6.2 percent a year we can achieve zero emissions by 2100 while staying within the 3.6-degree limit. Although this is a steep cut, it still gives me hope.

I love modern society and all the benefits that readily available and “inexpensive” fossil fuels have brought us. However, fossil fuels have only been inexpensive because their users don’t pay their full costs. Rather, they are borne indirectly by society through the impacts of climate change. The artificially low price of fossil fuels makes it difficult for alternative energy sources, such as renewable and nuclear energy, to compete in the market place. Consequently, innovation is stifled and it becomes more difficult to move ideas from the laboratory into practice.

In spite of that, many innovative things are being done that can revolutionize our energy systems if given a level playing field to compete on. These include more efficient solar cells, better energy storage devices, wireless battery charging technology, and even carbon nanotubes capable of absorbing the sun’s radiation and storing it in chemical form. Technical advances like these give me hope.

People worldwide aspire to a standard of living like ours and have every right to pursue it. However, if they do so with fossil fuels, we face disaster. Thus, we must put fossil fuels aside. This will be an enormous task, but we can accomplish it if we begin now. We must put a price on carbon. If done through a revenue-neutral fee and dividend approach, warming can be kept within 3.6 degrees and our economy can be strengthened. This also gives me hope.

Although I am willing to be called alarmed, it is time to quit the finger pointing and name-calling. It does no good to dismiss climate change as if it doesn’t exist or to rail against nonexistent conspiracies, as this newspaper does. Neither does it do any good to think the problem can be solved easily. Rather, we need to put the past behind us and create an environment where innovation can flourish.

Dr. Grady lives in Harrisonburg.

Find a link to I Am One Of The Alarmed here. A printable pdf version is here.

Les Grady is an active member of the Climate Action Alliance of the Valley Steering Committee. He currently heads up the organization’s Speakers Bureau. He served as Steering Committee Chairman from 2012 through 2014.

February 7, 2015

Weatherize Harrisonburg for Energy Efficiency

The next meeting of Weatherize Harrisonburg/Rockingham will be on:

Monday, April 20, 2015 5:00-6:30PM, Gilkerson Community Activities Center Craft Room 2
Westover Park
305 S.Dogwood Dr., Harrisonburg.

All welcome!
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We are helping to plan a Public Meeting with representatives of Community Housing Partners sponsored by the Northeast Neighborhood Association on Thursday, March 26 at 7:00 PM, Simms Center, 620 Simms Ave., Harrisonburg.

If you qualify as a low-to-moderate income household, Community Housing Partners can help reduce your energy bills, make your home more comfortable, energy efficient and affordable year round. Clients approved for the Weatherization Assistance Program will receive a free energy audit which will determine the work that can be done in your home.

Join the Northeast Neighborhood Association at this meeting with representatives of Community Housing Partners and Weatherize Harrisonburg/Rockingham to learn more and obtain an application.

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February 26, 2015, Meeting at the downtown library:

First Meeting! — First Meeting on February 26!

Our agenda for the meeting is to learn who you all are and where your interests and expertise lie. Are you interested in helping to ferret out all existing weatherization programs and funding sources, whether “official” or volunteer? Do you work with an agency or business or volunteer group already involved in a program ? Do you know groups of people who might be in need of having their houses worked on? Do you have useful contacts with any of the above or would you like to develop some?

We want to flesh out the list we’ve begun from online sources and add to it with personal contacts, and we need your help to gather as much information as we can. Only then can we decide the best ways of making the information available to the people who need it, whether it’s an online website, public meetings, or going door to door–or all of the above.

We can also decide how often we need to meet, when, and where.

Hope to see you tomorrow.
Joni Grady, Joy Loving, Les Grady

Find our working document of resources here: WHAT WE KNOW and DON’T KNOW about Local Weatherization/Energy efficiency options. Please offer any comments and contributions you may have!

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We ended the advocacy workshop last month talking about ways to improve the energy efficiency of low and middle income homes in our area. Energy efficiency is the cleanest, cheapest fuel there is. It is one of the cornerstones of the President’s Climate Action Plan. It can save low and middle income families real dollars and let them benefit even more should a revenue neutral carbon fee be put in place. And the feds have been working on it since 1976, almost 40 years! Here in Virginia, Governor Terry McAuliffe signed a proclamation designating October 30, 2014, as Weatherization Day. The WAP (Weatherization Assistance Program) network was also recognized at the Governor’s Housing Conference in Norfolk, Virginia last November.

There are other programs that Valley residents could tap into if they only knew about them and had some assistance in making use of them. Members of the Climate Action Alliance of the Valley have decided to create an ad hoc committee to:

1) create a database of programs already in place or potentially available, the people involved, what they offer and to whom

2) get the information out to the people who need it and help them connect to the help that’s offered

3) hopefully hold a one-day volunteer weatherization event, put actual (work) boots on the ground

We need your help. The first step is the research and data gathering, an activity a lot of you who came to the workshop were very interested in! We have begun making lists of program/contacts, just as we did at the workshop, but we also need to figure out exactly what information we need to put into the database. And when that’s done, we need people who will gather that information from the online links and then call the contacts to fill in missing information.

I know you’re interested in making a real difference in the Valley so join us for an hour to plan and organize. Also, please let us know if you’re interested in the project but just can’t make the meeting.

Joni Grady, ad hoc committee on Energy Efficiency
contactcaav[at]gmail.com

Update, February 16, 2015.

Joy Loving and I have been busily gathering some background information to find out what we know and what we don’t know about the weatherization options available to low and middle income residents of Virginia and Harrisonburg in particular.

Please look it over–it’s the Weatherization document on Google Drive –and make any comments (using Review) you might have about people you know, groups that you know, etc. When we do meet, we’ll at least have this as a basis for making a plan for further action and know what blanks we need to fill in. We’ll update it as we continue to find more clues to what we can do and we’ll incorporate your comments appropriately. One overall impression that I have gotten is that Virginia and Harrisonburg are strong supporters of energy efficiency action–as long as the feds are paying for it. Which means that there will be ample opportunity for advocacy as well as local action.

We have been asked to attend the NorthEast Neighborhood Association meeting Thursday, February 19 at 7pm at Simms School to introduce what we’re thinking of doing and the information we need from homeowners.

I’m excited about the opportunities we have for making even a small difference where we are.

Joni Grady
540-209-9198

February 5, 2015

Clean Energy Lobby Day 2015

CAAV steering committee member Alleyn Harned and CAAV member Bishop Dansby participated in Clean Energy Lobby Day in Richmond on Tuesday, February 3, 2015.

Read about Clean Energy Lobby Day from Ivy Main here.

Bishop took some photos and offered comments:

CleanEnergyDay1 — Francis Hodsoll, President, Virginia Advanced Energy Industries, kicks off the press conference at Clean Energy Lobby Day, February 3, 2015. Speakers included senators and delegates from both parties.

Secretary of Commerce and Trade, Maurice A. Jones, meets with and takes questions from the renewable energy industry people. In addition to attendees from Virginia, there were some from other states, including Maryland and California. Maryland solar business owners pointed out that they can draw from a trained workforce, as Maryland community colleges award certificates in solar installation.

Alleyn Harned, Virginia Clean Cities, networks with Francis Hodsoll.

Clean energy day industry attendees were matched up to talk with legislators in their offices. Harrisonburg’s Alleyn Harned and Bishop Dansby visited with Arlington County Delegate Randy Minchew (R). They found Minchew to be very progressive on clean energy matters.