February 1, 2011: In This Issue
º Billionaires Out to Get the EPA
º Find Us on Facebook
º Students Kick Out the Coal
º Home on the Range for Wildlife
º Laotian Time Bombs
º Investing in the Next Economy
Still Time for a Winter Outing
Chart a path through your choice of frozen landscapes on one of our winter trips. Embark on a winter sports medley in Tahoe National Forest, ski from hut-to-hut in Quebec's backcountry, or join a cruise through the icy waters of Antarctica, viewing penguins, whales, and soaring albatrosses.
Looking for something else? You can search our listings of over 300 Sierra Club trips, including lodge-based outings, family vacation, wilderness backpacking, international excursions, and plenty more. |
Cleaning your dryer's lint filter can slash its energy usage by as much as 30 percent!
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Muir the Artist
John Muir not only hiked and sang the praises of the Sierra Nevada -- he also sketched what he saw. Many of those drawings first appeared 100 years ago, when he published My First Summer in the Sierra. Artist and teacher Sue Fierston blogs in "Explore" about the artistic side of the Sierra Club's founder. |
1) Emily Green, Sierra Club's Great Lakes Director, on a big threat to the Great Lakes that many don't know about: invasive Asian carp 2) Eugene Buchanan on his new book Outdoor Parents, Outdoor Kids 3) Avital Binshtock from Sierra magazine gives tips on greening our schools 4) Annie Somerville, executive chef of Greens restaurant, shares green cuisine tips.
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Big Oil's "Doing Just Fine"
The Oil Spill Commission recommended a number of safeguards to restore the Gulf Coast and prevent future catastrophes. But some in Congress say the oil industry can't afford them. Well, the Big Oil companies released their profit reports this week, and guess what? Big Oil can afford it!
Call your U.S. senators and tell them to hold Big Oil accountable by acting on the Commission's recommendations. |
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For years, billionaires David and Charles Koch have given millions to Tea Party candidates and anyone else who fights efforts to promote clean energy and stop climate change.
Last weekend, this dangerous duo met behind closed doors with other big-money donors and political strategists to plot how to end the EPA's authority to protect our clean air and water. Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune blogged about why the Koch brothers threaten America's future -- and how we can stop them. |
The Sierra Student Coalition and the Sierra Club's Campuses Beyond Coal campaign scored a big victory this year when Pennsylvania State University announced that it will stop burning coal.
Students had collected more than 2,000 petition signatures and photos, hosted rallies, built coalitions with faculty and alumni, and held several meetings with top administrators to demand that the university end its use of coal on campus. |
Thanks to the efforts of the Sierra Club and others, Bridger-Teton National Forest Supervisor Jacque Buchanan announced that an additional 44,000 acres of the Wyoming Range will be off-limits to oil and gas drilling. These newly protected areas include important habitat for the threatened Canada lynx, as well as moose, mule deer, elk, and pronghorn.
Together with our allies, we have now protected 1.2 million acres of the Wyoming Range from oil and gas development, but the work continues as the Range currently faces proposals for over 100 new wells.
Please thank Supervisor Buchanan for standing up for Wyoming's wild places.
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During the Vietnam War, the United States flew 580,000 bombing runs over the country of Laos -- an average of one every eight minutes for nine years.
Today, Laotians live and die among 80 million unexploded munitions, some of them valuable as scrap metal or turned into flower boxes, many of them as dangerous as the day they dropped from the sky. Sierra magazine tells the little-known story of a war's explosive environmental legacy.
Photo courtesy Jerry Redfern |
"Fracking" is on its way to becoming a household term -- so much so that Josh Fox's Gasland snagged an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary. Gasland exposes the extensive groundwater pollution caused by hydrofracking, an aggressive, rock-shattering method for extracting natural gas.
We were especially excited about the nomination because the Activist Network Hydrofracking Team is currently sponsoring house parties to watch Gasland -- we knew it was good before the Academy did! We'll be watching with bated breath on February 27th, but in the meantime, house parties are being scheduled across the country, so sign up to attend or host your own. |
During his State of the Union address, President Obama said that investing in clean-energy technology "will strengthen our security, protect our planet and create countless new jobs for our people" and then listed several ambitious national goals, including one million electric vehicles on the road by 2015 and 80 percent of America's electricity from clean energy sources by 2035.
What does that mean for green investors? According to Garvin Jabusch at Green Alpha Advisors, it means that people invested in "Next Economy" companies could do very well. |
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