No one denies the fact that the United States is addicted to oil and gas, and our dependence on it is not going to go away soon--if ever. But we can take steps to mitigate the effects of our dependence on the environment that we live in.
That's why Mark Udall, Tom Udall, and John Salazar passed common-sense provisions in the House version of the energy bill--to increase the share of renewables in our electric generation to 15% by the year 2020, to fund research into climate change and carbon capture, and to block drilling on federal lands atop the Roan Plateau in Western Colorado.
There's a growing coalition of people you wouldn't normally expect--sportsmen, hunters, fishermen, hikers, and environmentalists alike are coming together to tell the Federal government that the last wild places in the West are worth saving. They are saying it's not worth destroying a gem like the Roan Plateau for less than a month's worth of natural gas and six and a half minutes worth of oil.
They are saying no to industry-funded front groups like Americans for American Energy, which spent millions to advocate for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and now has its sights set on the Roan Plateau. This is the outfit which, until its web site went down for "construction," has pictures of Osama bin Laden and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on the front page saying that anyone who opposed unfettered destruction of federal lands is a supporter of terrorists. It's run by members of Dick Cheney's secret energy task force.
In September, the energy bill will be voted on by the Senate. The Senate bill does not currently have all of the provisions that the Udalls and John Salazar introduced, and there is a possibility that they could be stripped int he conference committee.
Show your support now. Sign Mark Udall's petition. He'll share it with his colleagues in the Senate and with the White House, and with our help he'll get us on the road to energy independence!
http://www.markudall.com/...
And then watch the video above, featuring Mark's brother. It's a snippet of a longer documentary that shows what is going down here in the Rocky Mountain West.