You may have wondered about the headline, but if you were alert, the word Sonoma might have alerted you to the fact that Chuck is still writing.  This is a piece he wrote as an account of a talk given by Middlebury College scholar-in-residence and environmental writer, climate change expert and activist, Bill McKibben.  As Chuck wrote, “Climate change and efforts to ameliorate it are the most important subject in the world because, as McKibben argues, if we ignore what we are doing to our atmosphere we may very likely make much of the earth uninhabitable for our children and their children.  Because this is such an important topic and because McKibben is a New Englander, I thought that the story should be shared with readers of the Walpolean.”

McKibben Urges Sonoma Audience Toward Environmental Activism

by Chuck Bingaman, Freelance Journalist

Environmental writer, scholar, activist Bill McKibben drew a standing ovation from a Sonoma crowd of nearly 200 Sunday urging active steps to end the country’s–and the world’s–dependence on burning fossil fuels for energy beginning with a demonstration in Sonoma next Saturday.

Stumping the country on behalf of his most recent book, “Oil and Honey: The Education of an Unlikely Activist”, McKibben described the www.350.org program he started in 2008 at Middlebury College with seven undergraduates including May Boeve of Sonoma. 350.org has since coordinated 15,000 rallies against reliance on fossil fuel for energy in 189 countries. McKibben’s appearance Sunday was sponsored by Stone Edge Farm, Congregation Shir Shalom, the First Congregational Church of Sonoma, Readers’ Books and http://www.350.org.

Introduced by Readers’ Books co-owner Andy Weinberger as “a troublemaker in the best sense of the word”, McKibben has spent the last 28 years trying to get the attention of governments and large energy companies. 350 is the number of parts of CO2 (carbon dioxide) per billion at which the atmosphere begins to deteriorate, climate changes dramatically, and life as we know it on the planet is irretrievably harmed. Despite most measures now showing the atmosphere already containing more than 400 parts per billion and horrific climate changes are already happening, McKibben argues that there is still time to at least slow the growth of CO2 and to avoid the worst of possible future devastation.

Devastation McKibben cited included spreading droughts, worsening forest fires, “Biblical” floods such as those currently battering Colorado, melting icecaps and resulting rises in sea levels that promise to devastate large areas of human habitation worldwide in the not-distant future. He also described–and showed poignant pictures of–people throughout the earth demonstrating for the 350.org movement. Participants included many children in China, India, Pakistan, Africa, South America, Europe and the USA. “I’ve always been told,” McKibben said, “that environmentalists are limited to rich white people in already wealthy countries. But we’ve found that the majority of those expressing concern about the environment are actually poor, brown, tan or black, Asian and others likely to be hurt the most. And they are the least responsible for what is happening.”

Germany, McKibben said, has been a leader in switching to solar energy, and already in 2013 it produced–on one day–more than half of its energy from solar. The reason such transition has not happened in the US, McKibben says, is that large energy companies have had the financial and, hence, political clout to prevent it. What he said is needed to change priorities in the US is a movement, a massive standing up of people who say enough is enough. “All we want is a planet that works like the one we grew up in. You know, ice caps at the poles, flooding that is the exception rather than a frequent devastation. I consider that a very conservative position. Those from the energy companies that are willing to change the chemical composition of the earth, now THOSE are the radicals in this fight!”

Note: The Sonoma 350.org organizer, May Boeve, announced a demonstration called “Draw the Line” at Sonoma City Hall Saturday, September 21, at 9:00 a.m. to urge President Obama to deny approval of the Keystone Project for a new pipeline from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. McKibben said reliable estimates are that, if all of the shale oil to be extracted and piped through the US were to be burned, the CO2 it would release could raise the atmospheric level well over 500 parts per billion. That, as a NASA report said, would amount to “game over for the planet.”