Progress Toward Carbon Fee and Dividend on Both Sides of the Aisle in Congress

Movement toward Carbon Fee and Dividend legislation has occurred on both the Republican and Democratic sides of the US House of Representatives: Read More

Clean Power Plan Upheld by Appeals Court

On January 21st a federal appeals court refused to block Obama administration regulations aimed at reducing power plant pollution while a legal battle wages on.  Read More

Want to Know More About

Elders Climate Action?

Join Our First ECA Members Conference Call

 

Wed, Feb 10th, 12 Noon Pacific Time

ECA will be holding our first Members Conference Call on Wednesday, February 10th at Noon Pacific Time, 3pm Eastern Time.  Our first guest speaker will be Danny Richter, Citizens Climate Lobby Legislative Director.  Danny will give an overview of Carbon Fee and Dividend, how it will work, and what the impacts will be.  And he'll talk about how we can best work for passage of this critical legislative proposal.

Sign up for the call by sending an email to:

eldersclimateaction@gmail.com.  Just say "Members Conference Call" in your email, and we'll send you the details for logging into the call.

Divestment is the opposite of investment. If we care about the impact of fossil fuels on our planet we can make our personal contribution and not support the fossil fuel industry by investing in those companies. Divestment campaigns have made a difference in the past, the most noted being around the issue of South African Apartheid. Divestment in South Africa helped bring in democracy to that area. Following are some helpful strategies and toolkits that you can use to begin the conversation about divestment from fossil fuels. You may not be aware that many pension funds are invested in fossil fuels as well as many government entities. The voices of elders can make a difference not only in individual investments but also at a corporate or government level.

If you own stock in individual companies as part of your retirement savings, you might want to consider becoming a shareholder activist, holding those companies to an ethically and socially responsible standard. This can be done as an individual or as a group. When you form or participate in a local ECA chapter, your group may want to organize around this action. The Shareholder Activist website provides a wealth of information to help you do this.

www.divestor.org website

Unearthing the Fossil Fuels in Mutual Funds 

Carol J. Louse, Financial Advisor, November, 2015

If you're into green investing, do you really know what's in your portfolio? Andrew Behar, the CEO of As You Sow, an Oakland, California based nonprofit that works with shareholders to promote corporate responsibility, discovered he didn't when he began digging around in the mutual funds of his employer-sponsored 401(k) Read more

 
OK - you've used Fossil Free Funds, looked inside your employer-sponsored retirement plan mutual fund holdings, and have determined that you want to make some changes. So what's next? Here is a link to begin the conversation with your retirement plan manager or financial advisor. (From Fossil Free Funds.org) 

If you are an individual investor you can take the Divest-Invest pledge from gofossilfree.org, to move your money out of fossil fuels. This pledge is also available on the ECA website for your convenience.

As You Sow has developed a search tool to identify exposure to various fossil fuel companies and the funds they are contained in. Follow this link for an easy to use tool to see if your savings are invested in fossil fuels. Fossil Free Funds

Reinvest Your Home

If some or all of the money that has been freed up through divestment is not in an IRA or other retirement account, think about reinvesting in your home. Some tips to "reinvest" your home are here. An example to save energy is through the use of advanced power strips.

I am 64 years old. That is something I have trouble absorbing. Yes, I have a bit of arthritis and my hair is gray, but I don't relate to 64. Inside, I feel much closer to 40. And after years of "being" my job, I want to do something that really matters to me.

I look at my nephew and his wife, both in their 20s, and feel a cold fear that this is the best part of their lives, that 10 or 20 years from now they may be struggling to survive in a world where extreme weather events, rising sea levels and extensive droughts undermine the economic system that has made post-World War II life so comfortable and secure for all of us. This is what matters to me.

Few issues have as much impact on the future as climate change. Sadly, the issue of climate change has taken a backseat to economic policy, divisive cultural issues and the threat of terrorism. The main reason for this is the media coverage of these issues.

Read more 

Watch this commercial from Science Debate where kids ask "Why don't the Candidates for President Debate Science?"

Robert Zullo, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, January 4, 2016

Among the first pieces of legislation city council President Bruce Kraus will put forward in 2016 will be a bill aimed at extricating the city pension funds' investments from fossil fuels.

At a council meeting last week, Mr. Kraus told a group of activists from the Divest Pittsburgh campaign that his office is working from a draft measure the group submitted to council members in December and hopes to have a bill ready soon for introduction. Read more 

Valerie Volcovic, Reuters Washington, January 15, 2016

The Obama administration, in the first major review of the country's coal program in three decades, on Friday ordered a pause on issuing coal-mining leases on federal land as part of new executive actions to fight climate change. Read more

Anne Minard, January 6, 2016. Indian Country

Environmental groups are threatening to sue federal agencies over the feds' recent approval of ongoing operations at the Navajo Mine, which supplies the notoriously polluting Four Corners Power Plant in the eastern Navajo Nation. Read more

Want to help protect our planet for future generations? You're busy.  We know it.  How about One Hour? Want to do more, let us know.

Here are some things you can do that take less than an hour.  

INDIVIDUAL

by Vanessa Green, Campaign Director, DivestInvest

Have you pledged to personally divest from fossil fuels yet? Join the growing effort to engage individual investors across the economic spectrum in the global clean energy transition.

Divest Invest Individual, complements and coordinates with other fossil fuel divestment movement leaders like 350.org , Divest Invest Philanthropy, and Europeans for Divest Invest. At the COP21 Climate talks in Paris last month, they jointly reported $3.4 Trillion in fossil free commitments from 500 institutions and 46,000 individuals internationally -- including Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo and U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse.

"Look at Divest Invest," said Leo in a recent Wired interview . "It's something I'm involved in, and it's a fantastic way you as an individual can say, 'I do not want to have investments in oil, coal, or gas.'"

Despite the substantial challenges of the tragic events preceding COP21, people on their own or as stakeholders in universities, foundations, faith groups, health care institutions, businesses, NGOs and other groups demonstrated a huge and global appetite for bolder climate leadership from government and civil society.

Divest Invest Individual will continue to mobilize and embolden the global divestment grassroots to pressure the finance sector to accelerate development of fossil free retirement funds, mutual funds, ETFs and other financial vehicles for shifting more money behind our energy future rather than the legacy past. Pledge today via our News from our Partners page .

This slim paperback is amazing because, although it delves deep into the "science" of climate change, the authors do so in an easy to understand fashion.

Using a hypothetical climate change denier named Brad; the authors take each of Brad's arguments against anthropogenic climate change, look at the supposed facts and "science" supporting those arguments, and then explain why each argument is based on cherry-picked data or a mistaken understanding of the underlying science.

In the process, they offer a clear, understandable explanation of the science and evidence on climate change that those of us who never took science courses can easily understand. These explanations are presented not as lectures but as easy going, often humorous, conversations with the reader.

After reading this book, you will never again hear someone sounding off on how climate scientists have got it all wrong without the ability to provide a clear and solidly-based refutation of those arguments.

 

The European Space Agency has a website with some fun activities and a coloring/workbook for kids. www.esa.int

 

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