Climate Files 64 / Al Gore’s Call to Action
Al Gore fills us in on facts and strategy to help our lawmakers to accomplish something useful on climate change, for a change. We need to either change our legislators minds on global warming, or plan for the worst now. Unfortunately, we probably can’t adapt to the 4 or more degree temperature rise in global average temperature that seems inevitable. What is the U.S. doing about it? What they are doing is being done in secret to avoid advertising problems (This is how it is being described). Senator John Kerry and two other senators have shown industry leaders their 8-page draft bill on climate and energy. We don’t get to see it, but it has been discussed and this episode lets you in on what is known about it so far. Reportedly, it contains targets that are a bit lowered than the bill that passed in Congress, and more allowances for industry, energy, coal, natural gas and oil. From what I have read about it, it emphasizes jobs, but sounds like a planetary train-wreck on climate change.
The U.S. government is planning for adaptation and ‘resilience’ for the government — not necessarily for us. Yet they won’t act decisively to stop carbon emissions.
On March 16, 2010, the Task Force released an Interim Progress Report which outlines the Task Force’s progress to date and recommends key components to include in a national strategy on climate change adaptation.
The Interim Progress Report is available for 60 days of public comment. Submit comments here.
Al Gore spoke to supporters and the public in an open conference call on Monday, March 15th, in conjunction with Repower America. Senator Sherrod Brown also spoke. Hear Al Gore’s call to activist action in this episode, and find out what you can do to help push climate legislation in the U.S. along. One suggestion he had is to write letters to Senators. See more at Repower America. Write letters to your congressmen!
Finally, the last talk in this episode is an interview with Lester Brown, author of his newly revised book, Plan B 4.0. This is the premier Post Carbon Exchange interview, and they plan a series of these in the future. You can check out his book and read more at the Post Carbon Institute.
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Climate Files 60 Special / The Gates Equation
This is a special edition of Climate Files of a highly anticipated talk by Bill Gates, who has come up with an equation you see in this graphic. He presented this at the latest TED conference during a short talk on February 12th. This was followed by a short Q&A at TED and on livestream.com. Gates says he’s happy to get Twitter questions, so visit his website and fire off some questions to him.
Gates discussed energy, his “equation”, and his goal in life at the TED conference — getting us to zero carbon by 2050. He feels this is doable in a variety of ways. (These are his ideas and are not necessarily endorsed by myself or by Climate Files, but they are interesting.) He is getting a large amount of criticism from some environmentalists for saying that we need an “energy miracle” and lots of tech development to solve the climate problem. As he defines “miracle”, I mostly agree with his ideas on climate change. (Read an article discussing this here.) He is promoting nuclear power and not just any nuclear power but specifically, a “traveling wave” type of nuclear power, which is being developed by a company called TerraPower.
Is Gates just another T. Boone Pickens trying to cash in? Nope, Gates actually does understand and believe in the importance of climate change and is really seeking zero carbon solutions, unlike Pickens.
If you are wondering what Gates is up to besides caring what happens to the atmosphere, you should know that he is personally investing his own money into these ideas. He is spending quite a bit of thought and some of his great wealth on thinking about not just seeds and malaria, but also zero-carbon energy. Check out another article from last Monday for more on what Gates is doing to promote zero carbon energy. “When we talk about zero climate emissions, we sound crazy. When Bill Gates does it, bankers pick up the phone,” from Alternet.
(This episode of Climate Files is sans commentary from yours truly because I’m on a working break, and the plan is that this podcast will still return to weekly or bi-monthly episodes at some point.)
Download this episode here — it’s a short one — or listen here or subscribe on the right. For an interesting graphic I found of Bill Gates after he left Microsoft, click on more. I wanted to include it for the cover art for the podcast but it needed the equation on it to make sense!
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