Hammering in Some Climate Hope This Fall

Bill McKibben is a member of Change.org's Changemakers network, comprised of leading voices for social change. He is the founder of 350.org, an international climate campaign, and has led the organization of the largest demonstrations against global warming in American history.

It’s been a brutal summer, obviously, from smoke-shrouded Moscow to flood-soaked Pakistan—the summer when we really saw what global warming looks like in its early stages.

But we plan on making it a remarkable fall—the fall when we really see what people taking action can start to accomplish.

The stark failure of the U.S. Congress to even vote on climate legislation (for the 21st straight year) means that people around the world are going to have to start taking matters into their own hands. On 10-10-10, people in almost every nation will be doing practical things: putting up solar panels, digging community gardens, planting mangrove forests along rising shorelines. In Auckland, squads of bike mechanics will try to repair every cycle in the city; in Bolivia they’ll be handing out solar ovens; in Ann Arbor, Michigan they’re building raised-bed gardens in the front yards of low-income areas.

But we know we can’t actually solve climate change one bike path or farmer’s market at a time. So the day will also send a sharp political message—at day’s end, people will put down their shovels and pick up their cellphones. They’ll call their leaders and say: ‘We’re getting to work, what about you? If I can get up on a roof and hammer in a solar panel, I expect you to get up on the Senate floor and hammer out some legislation.”

Some leaders have already heard that message: in the low-lying (and entirely Muslim) nation of the Maldives, for instance, President Mohammed Nasheed has pledged to turn his official residence solar-powered on 10-10. But we need everyone to hear it, before the UN reconvenes in Mexico in December to take up where they left off at Copenhagen last year.

If the pictures from Russia and Pakistan saddened you, then 10-10-10 is the moment to make that sadness count. I urge you to sign this pledge to get involved and look for an event taking place near you here. Many thanks for joining in!

Photo credit: 350.org