I don’t spend much time in DC. Like everyone else in the movement I’ve been at work around the country, fighting frack wells and pipelines, coal ports and LNG terminals. Because the fossil fuel industry is everywhere we have to be everywhere too.
But sometimes we have to come together, if only to remind ourselves that there are lots of us. And this time it’s more than that—the real mission is to change forever the progressive debate in America about climate change. For years, even when Democrats are in power, we’ve gotten half-measures—well-intentioned, and a hell of a lot more than Donald Trump will ever give us, but not enough to catch up with the relentless pace of physics. This is a hard question, perhaps the hardest ever, because it comes with a time limit, one that draws perilously near. (That’s what it means when your icecaps start to melt).
And so some of the biggest news of the week came ahead of Saturday’s big march. Earlier this morning up on Capitol Hill Jeff Merkley and Bernie Sanders—flanked by leaders of the climate justice movement like Vien Truong and Elizabeth Yeampierre--introduced a new bill requiring that America move to 100% renewable energy. Requiring that they do it before the century is half out. 100% is a big number. It’s, well, all of it. No more coal and gas and oil; instead, electricity from the sun and wind and water supplying our needs. Not a little bit, not some token solar panels, not windmills just in Iowa and the Dakotas. All the power for the most power-thirsty nation on earth.
We know we can do it technically—the price of solar panels falls as fast as their efficiency rises. There are days when the Danes generate more power than they use from the wind—and Denmark is no windier than we are. Batteries are suddenly the hottest of new tech, getting better by the quarter.
The question is, can we do it politically? Can we stand up to the power of the fossil fuel industry, which is desperate to drag out the inevitable transition to clean energy as long as possible. Under Trump, no. Obviously. I mean, the man is spending the week rewriting the law so we can drill for oil in more national parks. Because hey, nothing says National Park like a derrick.
But assuming Trump loses some day and adults regain control of our political life, we have to hit the ground with a plan and a pace—we have to go fast and hard out of the gate. If Trump could be said to have given us any kind of gift, it would be that he’s spurred the resistance we saw last week in the Scientists March and that we’ll see Saturday on the mall with the PCM. That resistance is key—we need to show everyone that there’s huge support for big measures, and that that support comes from all quarters. At long last the movement seems serious about climate justice, about the communities that get hit hardest—the places that need relief first and fastest.
The Merkley/Sanders bill sets a new standard. It’s actually approaches the scale of change we need, and once we get started I bet we’ll get there faster than 2050. 100 is the number from here on in. And so we march!