Dear friends of The Climate Center,
The latest science underscores what we, and millions of people around the world, are experiencing all too regularly: the impacts of climate change are hitting harder and faster than expected, posing grave threats to our health and well-being.
To put us on track for a vibrant, healthy future, and to avoid irreversible consequences, we must dramatically accelerate timelines for equitable emissions reductions and sequestration.
We need you, now more than ever, to help launch our new, collaborative statewide campaign: Rapid Decarbonization for a Climate-Safe Future.
The Climate Center is poised to lead California on this urgent mission.
Securing an equitable, climate-safe future
Over the next 5 years, we will expand and mobilize our statewide network of local governments, NGO’s, business, labor, and state policymakers to accelerate climate action timelines and advance rapid decarbonization.
Your donation today will help The Climate Center engage diverse partners to enact rapid and equitable decarbonization policies in California.
With your continued support, we will seize this moment to collaboratively enact by 2025 the bold policies required by science to put California on track for decarbonization by 2030. We will set an example for other states, the nation, and the world.
Our overarching strategy is to build a powerful and growing coalition of climate advocates who will drive policy change in Sacramento, focused on the six strategic objectives below.
This suite of rapid decarbonization policies is based on the latest science and climate reality.
Together we will drive the ambitious, yet essential, policy changes required to secure a safe climate, starting in California, just as we have catalyzed the widespread use of clean power through Community Choice Energy.
Thank you for making your most generous gift today to support Rapid Decarbonization
Our six strategic objectives are to:
- Achieve a formal state commitment by no later than 2022 to rapid decarbonization including carbon neutrality by 2030 and net negative emissions by 2035.
- Create a vast network of clean, distributed, resilient energy & storage and 100% GHG-free energy for all Californians by 2030.
- Achieve 80% sustainable mobility by 2030 including phasing out sales of new fossil fuel-powered vehicles starting in 2025.
- Double carbon sequestration on 25 million acres (one-fourth of our state) by 2030.
- Fund implementation of local resilience measures no later than 2025, to protect our families and neighborhoods from growing extremes such as drought, fire, heat and floods, starting with low-income communities.
- Enact multiple green financing mechanisms no later than 2025 such as a Frequent Flyer Fee and Carbon Fee and Dividend to yield the billions of dollars needed annually to retool our economy to become fossil-free.
Clean, Safe, Resilient and Smart Community Microgrids
One of our top policy priorities in the next two years is to ensure California allows, funds and provides technical support for communities to create microgrids—local clean energy production and storage—to help us weather planned and unplanned outages while also reducing emissions.
The Climate Center is working to establish a decentralized power system of clean energy microgrids across California, starting with critical facilities in low-income communities, through our Advanced Community Energy (ACE) program.
As we face increases in climate change-driven, extreme fire conditions, our goal is to keep the lights on while also countering the rise of dirty fossil-fuel-powered back-up generators that exacerbate the problem.
ACE will help ensure that essential health, fire, police, food, water, and other services will remain powered during outages.
Through ACE, we will collaboratively engage and support local governments, communities, electric distribution utilities, renewable power developers, and technology companies to implement decentralized, 21st Century clean energy and storage systems—better for the climate and better for our communities!
We can and must do more
The remaking of our century-old utility infrastructure is one example of the significant changes still needed in the state to achieve a climate-safe future. Despite its early global leadership on climate, California is falling behind.
While California achieved its legislated emissions reductions goals for 2020 early, many of our emissions are not counted, such as those from air travel and the out-of-state manufacturing of food and other products we consume regularly. And, emissions from transportation are actually rising, requiring significantly bolder action to achieve even modest climate goals by 2030.
We cannot be content with the slow progress that California is making on climate when everything is at stake.
Time is running out to reverse climate change impacts. There is no other organization in California focused on this multi-pronged strategy to fight climate change. The science is clear, as are the solutions. We CAN solve it by working together.
The Climate Center is raising $25 million over the next five years, starting with an ambitious goal of securing $2 million by spring 2020. We need the funds immediately to hire expert staff and consultants, and engage our partners, to start implementing the actions essential to our success. Every gift counts!
We need your help today. Please dig deep and significantly increase your financial support, commensurate with the urgency of the climate crisis.
Building on Community Choice Energy
The Climate Center has been a climate action leader since 2001 in California. Thanks to your partnership, we played a pivotal role in rapidly expanding Community Choice Energy to 19 agencies which now supply 88% clean energy to 11 million Californians, one-quarter of the state!
This remarkable progress continues as we expand our focus to help the Central Valley adopt a new Community Choice agency, opening the door for even more Californians to adopt clean, affordable energy. But much more must be done to decarbonize our economy soon!
With your generous support, we will succeed!
Our vision is that by 2025, California will have enacted the policies needed to put us on track to reverse the climate crisis by 2030.
This means committing to greatly accelerated policy timelines with much more aggressive action to achieve net-zero emissions, healthy carbon-sequestering ecosystems, and resilient communities.
Your generous gift today will help ensure accelerated climate action in California
With your generous support we will seize this moment to enact in California the bold policies required by science to begin reversing the climate crisis.
With optimism and gratitude,
Ellie Cohen, CEO
PS Read more about our campaign here. Please don’t hesitate to contact me with your suggestions or questions (ellie@theclimatecenter.org). I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you again for your generous support of The Climate Center’s urgent work!