Fridays for the Future (https://www.fridaysforfuture.org) – the Friday Climate Strikes continue
October 2 there will be a Global Solar Yatra (https://www.ggsy.in) with 1 million students in over 70 countries building their own solar lights for studying
October 7 Extinction Rebellion (https://xrmass.org/action/nyc-kickoff-global-rebellion/) will be doing actions around the world
Sunrise Movement (https://www.sunrisemovement.org) is planning actions in support of the Green New Deal up to and after the Inauguration of the next President in January 2020
September 20 was a great show of strength but what are we going to do tomorrow and the day after that? Is there a daily climate practice that can do what we need to get done in the time available? I know someone who used to write a letter to the editor to some publication around the world on climate issues every day. Now he does stand outs most mornings during rush hour traffic with his climate signs. Another is standing up in the train to talk about climate on the commute home. (“How did Solidarity start?” someone once asked Lech Walesa who answered, “By speaking loud at the bus stops.”) I have a solar swadeshi myself: http://solarray.blogspot.com/2005/05/solar-swadeshi-hand-made-electricity.html
and have been practicing Solar IS Civil Defense for 20 years:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/9/8/1697177/-Is-It-Time-to-Talk-About-Solar-Civil-Defense
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2007/3/30/317777/-
If the children can devote one day a week to climate issues, the adults should too. Climate strikes can evolve into climate teach-ins, brainstorms, hackathons, and barnraisings, especially if we have a daily climate action plan on international, national, regional, state, county, municipal, neighborhood, family, and individual scales with benchmarks and targets.
Greta Thunberg at the UN mentioned that we are on track to burn through our carbon budget, the amount of greenouse gases we can put into the sky and still stay within that “magic” 1.5º F heating range, within 8 years. That’s one benchmark. The idea that “we have a little more than a decade” to turn around climate comes from a 2017 paper from Christiana Figueres, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Gail Whiteman, Johan Rockström, Anthony Hobley & Stefan Rahmstorf. What gets mentioned less is their six-point plan with specific targets for turning the tide of the world’s carbon dioxide by 2020: https://www.nature.com/news/three-years-to-safeguard-our-climate-1.22201
However, China may reach its greenhouse gas emissions peak in 2022, far ahead of its 2030 schedule announced at the 2015 Paris climate meeting:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-carbon/china-co2-emissions-to-peak-in-2022-ahead-of-schedule-government-researcher-idUSKCN1VQ1K0
and Norway, Iceland, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Uruguay, Paraguay are all countries which get almost all their electricity from renewable energy now: https://www.climatecouncil.org.au/11-countries-leading-the-charge-on-renewable-energy/
Costa Rica plans to be a carbon neutral nation by 2021:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/climate/costa-rica-zero-carbon-neutral.html
Job One for Humanity (https://www.joboneforhumanity.org/plan) has a four point plan for climate action starting from emergency preparation and working on up to mass political and social change. Many of their ideas are not only adaptation to the weather emergencies they believe are now inevitable but also best practices which will also mitigate any more climate damage and improve individual, family, and local resilience.
Lots to do and lots we can do.
If anyone is interested, My Approach to Climate Change is available at http://solarray.blogspot.com/2018/12/my-approach-to-climate-change.html
