Alice's Sharebook 

Save AmericaâEUR(TM)s Rivers: Stop Nutrient Pollution - ForceChange 
Environment  (tags: water, pollution, rivers ) 
 Alice - 17 seconds ago - forcechange.com 

The Energy Bill is moving!

More than 2.5 million new, green jobs and energy independence are at stake.

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown has a plan to make it happen.

Tell your senators to support Sen. Brown's IMPACT Act of 2009!

Dear Alice Diane,

For decades, we have watched American manufacturing jobs shipped overseas. Now, as we face our highest unemployment rate in 25 years, the consequences of our complacency are crystal clear.

An America that can't manufacture its own goods will be a weak America. And with the clean-energy economy poised to grow exponentially, it's more important than ever to keep new jobs here.

Last Wednesday, Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio stepped up with a brand new proposal that lays the groundwork for the creation of more than 2.5 million new, green jobs. This plan provides an ironclad economic motivation for hesitant lawmakers from hard-hit states to support the Energy Bill.

The Energy Bill is moving – we need to act quickly. Tell your senators to support Sen. Brown's "Investments for Manufacturing Progress and Clean Technology (IMPACT) Act."

I was in DC last Wednesday with Apollo Alliance supporters to help build momentum for this bill – it's that important. We've calculated that it would create at least 680,000 new direct manufacturing jobs and nearly 2 million jobs outside the sector.

That means more than 2.5 million Americans put to work creating clean energy technologies. The bill would:

• Invest in loans to small- and mid-sized businesses to retool, establish, or expand clean energy manufacturing capabilities, and
• Increase funding to help manufacturers break into clean energy markets and adopt innovative, energy-efficient technologies.

Will you stand with Apollo and Sen. Brown? Urge your senators to support businesses, workers, AND the environment by supporting the "Investments for Manufacturing Progress and Clean Technology Act."

With your help, we can generate the resources – and the political will – to create green jobs in an industry that offers a more sustainable solution for our environment, our economy, and American workers.

Proposed mine would throttle Montana wilderness

Urge the U.S. Forest Service, Montana DEQ to protect grizzlies and bull trout against the Montanore mine

TAKE ACTION

Click here to urge the Forest Service and Montana DEQ to protect grizzlies, and bull trout against the Montanaore mine

Dear Alice Diane,

Two mines, one wilderness
Only 20-30 grizzly bears remain in and around the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness in northwest Montana. These bears are hanging on by a thread. Biologists say they can't survive the loss of habitat from one mine, let alone two!

Yet, two massive copper and silver mines are in the works. If approved, these mines will jeopardize the wilderness area, degrade rivers and lakes, and harm important wildlife species! The Bush Administration has already given the green light to the proposed Rock Creek Mine.

Now the Forest Service is considering approval of the Montanore Mine.

Undermining wilderness lakes
The Montanore mine will intercept ground water in the region and divert it into the mine's underground tunnels. Rivers and lakes that rely on this groundwater will suffer the consequences -- including alpine lakes in the Wilderness.

Bull trout at risk
The US Fish and Wildlife found that the Rock Creek mine would likely wipe out the bull trout fishery in Rock Creek. Now, the Montanore Mine is predicted to dewater and degrade the East Fork of Bull River - the most important bull trout stronghold in the region.

Pollution in perpetuity
The proposed Montanore Mine is predicted to generate 13 million gallons a year of polluted mine water in perpetuity.

TAKE ACTION
Enough is enough! Send a letter to the U.S Forest Service and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. Speak out on behalf of wilderness, water quality and wildlife!

Thanks for taking action,
Bonnie Gestring and Alan Septoff, EARTHWORKS

INSTRUCTIONS:

• Go to the action page.
• Read the sample letter at page bottom and edit it if possible. Customized letters have greater impact.
• Click "send my message" to send your message to the Forest Service and Montana Department of Environmental Quality.
• For more information, go to the action page.

Dear Alice,

Clean energy legislation will very likely be voted on NEXT WEEK. 

Watch our new ad and help us raise $50,000 to keep it on the air for the final critical days.

This is it. Next week, the House will very likely vote on landmark clean energy legislation.

And Big Oil is doing everything they can to defeat it.

I'm going to tell it to you straight - we could lose this vote if we don't act now.

That's why we put together an ad showing how clean energy can rebuild our economy, increase national security, and protect the planet – but we need to raise $50,000 RIGHT NOW to run this ad through the vote next week. 

Make an emergency donation of $50 or more today.

Thanks to the generous support of our members, we were able to win 12 of the critical 16 swing votes on this bill in the House Energy and Commerce Committee last month. But with the full House vote only days away, we need your help more than ever!

You and I have worked for years for the chance to pass legislation like this.  But Big Oil is mobilizing as never before. In just the first 4 months of this year they've spent almost $80 million trying to defeat clean energy legislation, pulling out all the stops to kill it - from high-paid lobbyists, to misleading ads, to threats to turn off the campaign funding spigots.

We're doing all we can to defeat them – meeting with key members of Congress, organizing tens of thousands of community members, phone-banking in swing districts, and running radio and TV ads like this one.

But with the House floor vote expected within days, we need the resources to do even more. 

Please help us keep this ad on the air and continue our essential grassroots campaign – make an emergency donation of $50 or more TODAY.

Alice, I know it from thirty years of fighting - our moment is here. This vote is our best opportunity strengthen and pass clean energy legislation this year - but Big Oil and Dirty Coal are fighting back – hard.  That's why we need your help today.

Thank you for everything you do for LCV and the environment.

Tell the EPA: “Protect Our Environment – Reduce Global Warming Pollution!”

Dear Alice Diane,

Submit your comments and add your voice to the public record in support of reducing greenhouse gas pollution! We must act now to protect our future from the worst effects of global warming.

The Environmental Protection Agency has issued an "endangerment finding" that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases represent a significant threat to public health and welfare. The EPA is accepting public comments on this finding until June 23—this is the first time the public has been asked whether we want to limit greenhouse gas pollution.

Add your voice to the public record! Submit your public comments today.

The EPA's finding, based on tens of thousands of public comments and years of work by EPA's career staff, recognizes that the increased flooding, droughts, wildfires, spread of disease, and heat waves that accompany global warming will harm people. We finally have an administration that elevates science over politics when it comes to the environment.

Right now, America has the opportunity to establish itself as a global leader on clean energy. By shifting to clean energy, and cracking down on the corporations that pollute the water we drink and the air we breathe, we will create economic prosperity, reduce our dependence on oil and coal, while tackling global warming at the same time.

We need to demonstrate overwhelming public support for reducing greenhouse gas pollution. Please submit your comments today.

Do you know someone else who cares about protecting our future for our children and the natural world we depend on? Help us to spread the word:
 Tell-a-friend!
Please use Tell-a-Friend instead of forwarding the message. The links in this message have been personalized for you.

Trouble with the "Take Action" links in the message? Try cutting-and-pasting this link into your web browser: http://audubonaction.org/campaign/epa_endangerment

Subject: Remove the Trojan Horse from Global Warming Legislation

Your representative is about to vote on legislation designed to stop global warming. Unfortunately, members of the House who answer to the worst polluters have succeeded in including a Trojan Horse at the heart of the legislation - a prohibition on Obama's EPA being able to use the Clean Air Act to take additional action on CO2.

This little known, almost secret provision actually guarantees that the United States will fall short of doing what the scientists tell us must happen - a reduction of 80% of CO2 emissions from their 1990 level.

Mr. Obama ran for president on a very strong global warming platform which achieved the 80% reduction, launched a cap and trade market without giving away free permits to polluters, and set strong standards for boosting clean renewable energy. Special interests are warping his pledge almost beyond recognition.

Tell EPA to Act Now on Climate Change

Take Action Today!

Dear Alice Diane,

After years of delay and denial from past administrations, the Environmental Protection Agency is finally taking steps to declare that greenhouse gas emissions threaten the public's health and welfare.

The time has come for this action, and we need to encourage the EPA to move swiftly on it.

The EPA is proposing two historic findings under the Clean Air Act: that greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, endanger public health, and that emissions from motor vehicles contribute to climate change. This is a critical first step for the EPA to take in order to tackle climate change pollution.

The findings follow a decision by the Supreme Court which said the EPA has authority to regulate pollutants responsible for global warming under the Clean Air Act. Earthjustice argued the case at the appellate level in 2005.

While the EPA's current proposal is a necessary first step, there are additional steps the EPA can take, such as setting actual standards to regulate greenhouse gases, particularly from motor vehicles in the U.S., which contribute 4 percent of climate change emissions, and from other mobile sources such as ships and airplanes, which contribute another 4 percent.

We know that the EPA is hearing from polluters in the fossil fuel industry who want to keep the status quo, stop the EPA from moving forward, and protect their record-breaking profits. We can't let them go unchallenged.

Please join with people across the nation and tell EPA to formally embrace these findings, and then act without delay to regulate greenhouse gas polluters.

To comment, go to our action alert page and see the sample letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. It will help you express your support for prompt moves by the EPA.

— Earthjustice
Because the earth needs a good lawyer

P.S. Every voice counts! Please tell your family and friends to submit a comment to the EPA on greenhouse gas regulation.

"All 178 House Republicans plan to vote against the $100 billion Iraq/AfPak War Supplemental to protest $5 billion for the International Monetary Fund. That means 39 Democratic opponents could defeat the bill. 36 Democrats promised to vote no, so we only need 3 more."

Kevin Zeese
Executive Director

Sincerely,

Dear Alice,

Don't let Big Oil derail clean energy legislation.

Email your Representative Today!

Last month, the House Energy & Commerce Committee took a huge step towards jumpstarting our economy with clean energy jobs when they passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACE.  Now, this legislation will be voted on as soon as next week in the House.

Passing this legislation will bring us closer than ever to truly putting us on a path to a clean energy future.  But, Big Oil is doing everything in their power to derail this legislation. Will you contact your Member of Congress to insist that this bill is strengthened and passed?

Click here to ask your Representative to strengthen and pass the ACES bill today.

This legislation will help both our economy and our planet by helping to create millions of jobs, reducing our dependence on oil, and cutting global warming pollution.  To make sure the bill creates even more clean energy jobs, we would also like to see improvements in the bill that strengthen requirements and increase investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency, as well as preserve the Obama administration's ability to regulate dangerous pollutants.

But, Big Oil and their cohorts in Congress are stopping at nothing to keep us addicted to dirty energy.  They are flooding the halls of Congress with misinformation, and we must counter their attacks. 

Please ask your Member of Congress to strengthen and pass this critical legislation.

Passing ACES legislation would jumpstart a clean energy economy by:

• Supporting the development of new clean energy sources, such as wind, solar and geothermal, by requiring utilities to generate at least 20% of their electricity from renewable resources, with a portion met through efficiency by 2020;
• Dramatically boosting energy efficiency in building, appliances, and homes, saving over $25 billion per year by 2030; and
• Reducing global warming pollution by at least 17% by 2020 and 83% by 2050.

Send a message to your representative today urging him or her to defend, strengthen and pass the American Clean Energy and Security Act (HR 2454).

We have a narrow window of time to move this legislation..  Please don't wait – email your Representative today.

Thank you for all that you do,

Sincerely,

Gene Karpinski
League of Conservation Voters