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Pitch

The world's many climate campaign leaders need to talk together and co-ordinate their efforts. We create a tool to kick-start a new unity.


Description

Summary

 

Humanity's biggest problem with fighting climate change is our inability to work together. If we want to win the battle, we need to quickly invent a tool which can enable us to overcome this.

To solve the climate crisis we need to shift from using fossil fuels to renewables. We need to stop polluting the atmosphere with carbon emissions. Now, if there was great public pressure for shifting to renewables, then we would see politicians shift their societies to renewables. But that pressure isn't there. So it doesn't happen.

So to solve the climate crisis we need to build public pressure. How do we do that? We build a broad, social movement that would create public pressure. Not yet another campaign, a global movement of people, counted in billions, not millions. 

How do we build such a massive global movement? There is only one way: by uniting the efforts, resources, manpower and skills of ALL the many organisations and activists who are ALREADY, in each their own way, working on this goal.

There are so many, and they have a tremendous outreach. All the networks are in place. All we need is to connect them and get them to work TOGETHER for the one single goal: Climate safety.

To do this we need a tool. The so-called ‘killer-app’. A ‘Climate Safety Toolbox’ which enables climate leaders to communicate in an open network and co-ordinate their efforts. 

The project has two phases. Phase 1 focuses on internal organisational work. Phase 2 focuses on communication with the public. 

The climate campaigners who are already "in the business" will continue to do what they are doing now. But we have created a "meta-frame" for them that makes the input they come with much more powerful, because it is united with the efforts of all the other climate campaigners on the planet.


Category of the action

Changing public perceptions on climate change


What actions do you propose?

 

The climate change battle is the most urgent and crucial of all the environmental battles which are lining up and calling for attention on this planet. But it is only one battle. One division leader must know what another division is doing, and get better at creating full clarity and simplicity for the ‘soldiers’ on the ground who want to know what to do next.

As of now, it is not like that. Since 2009, the world has been seeing campaign after campaign after campaign on climate change, and there is a fertile jungle of organisations and websites, growing and growing, dedicated to the important cause of combatting carbon emissions, and they all work on each their own goals, strategies and proposed solutions. Which on one hand is fantastic to witness. On the other hand, it is obvious, that if we want to actually win this battle, there is a need for better co-ordination of the many efforts.

The myriad of different campaigns, strategies and opinions make the climate change problem and the necessary transition from fossil fuels to renewables seem very complicated. But really, it isn’t. It boils down to understanding that the sky on this planet is no longer open for pollution. 

The dirt we have been throwing up in the atmosphere for more than a century doesn’t go away. The little carbon particles stay there, and they keep adding up. So now we have reached the limit for how much more coal, oil, gas and petrol we can burn. Former American Vice-President Al Gore put it this way: “We can’t keep using the atmosphere as if it was an open sewer.”

It is that simple. The issue can be explained in one single sentence. And the solution is just as simple: Stop using the atmosphere as if it was an open sewer. 

What the world badly needs is for good people and forward thinkers like Bill McKibben, Rob Hopkins, Al Gore, front-runner organisations like Sustainia, Ceres, Greenpeace, Carbon War Room, The Climate Institute, The Energy Collective, Beyond Zero Emissions, 10:10, large membership organisations and campaigns like Earth Day, the Global Campaign for Climate Action, the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition, Friends of the Earth, WWF, the Youth Climate Coalitions in the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, as well as the thousands of other hard-working, constructive campaigners, writers, thinkers, sustainability experts, activists organisations and groups to come somewhat closer together to one another in one, co-ordinated, global, non-political, non-governmental alliance/network which can raise not just a stronger voice because of bigger numbers but more importantly, transmit a sense of clarity and transparency in terms of directions: who is doing what and heading where, and why.

If we could show all this activity which is already taking place to the world, many would be impressed by the level in itself. What we need next is impact.

This is what we will be saying to them, and convince them they must do: First of all, begin to talk together! Create internal channels of communication, and then - via our new ‘meta-tool’ - we will be able to begin to provide the public with, for instance, your ‘Top 10 Climate Safety Visions’, your ‘Top 10 Climate Actions We All Must Do’, ‘Top 10 Political Actions All Governments Would Benefit From Doing’, provide us with links to the best and most efficient tools and apps that we should all know about, and in this way begin to create clarity, while narrowing down the routes we can take.

Split the jobs between you, try and avoid overlapping. And once you have cleared this up, link up to each other on your websites.

All of you work on slightly different sub-targets, each have different methods, different levels of ambitions, different access to funding, media and people in power – but you all share the same vision: a civilisation which runs on renewable energy and which leaves those fossil fuels in the ground.

To do that, we offer you this tool. You do not need to start flying around, burning tonnes of carbon for yet another series of COP-like summits. You can do this at a much more practical level from your computers at home. We need to get you all started on mapping the bigger picture for how you supplement each other, who does what, and how you have a range of solutions you can offer to the world in one, simple package.

It will require of you that you give up only promoting only your own ideas and that organisation of yours which you have put so much energy and time into building up, and for a period instead focus on how that stronghold of yours can fit into the bigger picture — and all the others will have to do the same.

A global alliance of more than 270 non-profit organisations all over the world was already set up long ago: the Global Campaign for Climate Action. But is this campaign succeeding in making everyone talk together? If not, then this is why we need something new.

Maybe any structure or body that starts up with an aim to create a global platform is bound to end up as just yet another organisation name in the myriad of organisation names? The many failed attempts to bring everyone closer together show us that what is needed is not a coalition or an alliance with an organised structure, but rather a network assisted by some good software. 

A plain Linkedin or Facebook group for climate campaign leaders could of course be a start, but I believe we should be able to do better than that. We should aim at requiring a toplevel domain-name ending on .climate which campaigners would only be able to register their website on when signing a contract and committing themselves and their organisation to a higher, common cause — plus that this commitment then would give you access to a database with the mail adresses and phone numbers of all the other climate campaign leaders on .climate

The policy behind the tool must be to seek simplicity. For so many different people with very different political views, cultures, languages and experiences to be able to work together, in the name of our planet’s and our grandchildren’s future, it is important that the alliance or coalition narrows its manifest down to aiming at one single and simple goal: Those fossil fuels obviously must stay in the ground. So what does that mean? Two things.

First of all, setting up a short list of demands that all members of the coalition quickly can agree to. American author and climate activist Bill McKibben’s shortlist is a good start: divest!, he says. But it is missing a few more things in relation to how we succeed in creating an energy-transition from fossil fuels to renewables.

A ‘manifest list’ should contain few - three, maybe four - demands such as:

1) All investment in and subsidies to fossil fuel projects must end immediately.(That’s Bill McKibbens campaign, already in place, just needing other organisations to step in as well)

2) Governments which have put a price on carbon emissions must quickly form a ‘carbon tax club’ and find out what they can do together to consolidate the concept and put pressure on countries without carbon regulations.

3) Massive ‘Marchall-plan-like’ public subsidies and private investments must be directed to developing, producing and enhancing renewables as well as energy saving technologies.

But this would not be up to us to decide, we'd have to let the climate campaign leaders themselves discuss this and reach an agreement on it.

The carbon tax tool is often mentioned by Al Gore and James Hansen, and they are right: It needs to be taken to a whole new level now, and there is no time to wait for some UN resolution to be agreed upon by 140 nations.  

Creating a climate campaign network/tool that actually works — because its leaders begin to co-operate and share rather than compete and all do the same things — could open up a new era where more companies and industries of all kinds begin to see the need to commit to this same single goal, and to openly advertise this commitment. Because those who don’t will be identified in the increasingly more powerful ‘buycott’ app (or apps), and in new campaigns which make it clear to all of us who the rogue carbon polluters are and who are the committed carbon reducers that we should support when we go shopping. 

The organisation Ceres has already started that process in the US, and The B Team on a global scale. The ‘network’ could help with combining their efforts.

Most important is that the members of the new climate campaign alliance/network must be able to create clarity on the overall demands very fast. Don’t start talking about including other important issues which humanity is also confronted with at the moment, such as fair trade, ending poverty, slashing the ‘growth’-paradigme, or saving the whales, because then the discussions will never finish.

Yes, we need to deal with all those issues as well, but not all at once. The minute we begin to complicate the picture, we loose people. And we disagree. Then we are back to square one.

It all does seem complicated and big. Which makes it seem hopeless. Too big an issue to even begin to think about. We are powerless. So we close our ears and continue doing all those things that the fossil fuel industry thrives from.

Which brings me to the second point: understanding something about the roots of the problem with the seemingly unstoppable carbon emissions, and throwing a good portion of time, energy and resources in that direction:

When it comes to that debate about how to keep the large amounts of money-making coal, oil and gas in the ground is not so different from the debate about the problems with prostitution, human trafficing, drugs, etc, where it all boils down to that as long as there is a demand for it, banning it and prosecuting the pimps and drug dealers doesn’t help. The problems persist as long as there are people who are willing to pay for it.

So we need to look at reasons why it is that these coal and oil companies in particular are so powerful and rich. Isn’t it because we all are ready to pay for their services?

We can’t all just turn ourselves into radical ‘warriors’ or ‘resistance fighters’ who are combatting a rogue fossil fuel industry and corrupt politicians – we need to also look at ourselves and look all the way to the roots of what creates the demand for the oil: our dependency of energy, and our willingness to pay for it. Because whenever I point one finger at the oil industry, there are three fingers pointing at myself. 

Considering the failure of the political leaders combined with the climate-carelessness among the CEOs of the fossil fuel industry, it is great to see now that a resistance movement is building up and that the fossil fuel madness is placed in the limelight. 

To be able to build on this momentum in the years to come, we need an extra lamp to be turned on and point it at those kind of green energy-production and sustainability solutions that will enable us to shut down those coal mines, not by force or by law but simply because we don’t need them and don’t like them anymore. The real boss of the oil industry is, and will always be, the customer.

The most important battle of our time takes place not in any parliament hall, but very close to ourselves.

The carbon emissions battle will be lost in a few years time unless we begin to take concrete “energy-choice action” on an individual level. The politicians must see from sales figures and trades reports that their voters are acting on climate change.  

The Transition groups have some good answers to how to go about this. There are hundreds of things to get started with. The list of tips, ideas and links like this page should be integrated in the tool. 

Sustainia100 is an annual guide to 100 innovative solutions from around the world that presents tangible projects, initiatives, and technologies at the forefront of sustainable transformation. They provide an example of the kind of constructive innovation and shift of thinking we need. This should be highlighted with the help of the tool. 


Who will take these actions?

 

Initially a group of volunteers from around the globe who believe in this idea of truly saving the planet.

• Independent and skilled programmers who are good at building up sites similar to Climate Colab and GetPrismatic.com

• Independent sustainability bloggers. We currently have a little network of 11 bloggers from around the planet, called Bloggers for Climate Safety, and we are discussing these kind of ideas already.


Where will these actions be taken?

 

Since it is initially an online project, everyone can contribute from their own computer, regardless where on the planet they are based.


How much will emissions be reduced or sequestered vs. business as usual levels?


What are other key benefits?

 

We can take action and fix the emissions-problem as individuals, locally, when we know that we are part of a strong global climate movement.

Attempts to create global climate movements are running. The American organisation 350.org is one of the most successful of them at the moment, running two strong campaigns. But we don’t see any of them ‘catching the drift’ – they have not yet created the new, global ‘Climate-Gandhi’, Luther King or Mandela of our time. 

And even though Al Gore and Bill McKibben are close to getting there, they each campaign with separate agendas. We need to get better at uniting the many good forces in the field. If we all had a “meta-unifier-tool”, then we would realise that we are already enough people on this planet who have enough common sense to transform the fossil fuel driven world, little by little, step by step, into one that runs on renewable energy — sun, wind, water dams. 


What are the proposal’s costs?

 

To convince funders and sponsors that an idea is good, we need to do more than just write an application. We need to get things in action, build an initial prototype of the software and start the project. “Don't tell it, show it.”

In that period we could of course try if crowdfunding could work, but my guess is that funding will be lacking in the beginning.Only if a philantropic person, or a fund, steps in, would we be able to take off financially.

I think of it as a project that doesn't have a "must have" budget, but only has a "nice to have" budget. There is no minimum, and there is no maximum. The more funders and people who would support it, the better we can make it. And if we make it good enough to make a difference, then there WILL be people and funds out there who would want to give a helping hand. Because what we are working with here is so urgent to humanity, and the world is hungry for something that is effective and creates true co-ordination in this field of probably already hundreds of thousands of activists, journalists, bloggers and scientists.


Time line

 

To start it up, we need to act very very fast. We should have a project description finished within a month. Then the fundraising part would take six months, and the project could begin to take off around November 2013, if we are optimistic. Everything must be speeded up because we are in a really bad hurry. 


Related proposals

 

I think there are a good number of CoLab proposals which would definitely be in relevant to include. I haven't had the time to look into them all yet. If you have a suggestion, let me know!


References

 

Read more on http://climatesafety.info/?p=2844 and on http://climatesafety.info/?page_id=37