Congress has provided a plethora of asinine sound bites over the past week.

Here, Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) says the science is not there. He's a long-time ignoramus of the scientific consensus. Inhofe's comments came today in reaction to a bill that was introduced in the House.

Here's Sierra Club's press release regarding the bill:

The news that the Obama administration is insisting that General Motors Chair Rick Wagoner step down as one of the conditions for continued federal support comes as no surprise. But there is a danger that everyone will miss the real lesson. What happened to GM is the poster child for what really created the economic crisis -- short time horizons. GM, Ford, and Chrysler all actually knew (and admitted in private conversations with the UAW) that their business model -- high-margin, low-fuel-efficiency SUVs built on outmoded technology platforms -- wasn't sustainable. But every year they told themselves that, while they had only a decade to catch up technologically with Japan and Europe, they could do the job in ten years. And every year, they gave themselves another year to begin.

This morning's New York Times calls Wagoner a "steady optimist", but the flaw here wasn't Wagoner's personal temperament -- it's an American business culture that has taught that short-term shareholder value, not long-term product leadership, is the test of management. The Big Three have been just as short-term focused as the banks, even though they're in a business where it takes years to bring new models to markets -- not the months in which an investment bank can change strategy and unload its positions.  It was the ability of Toyota and Honda to think ahead that enabled them to take so much market share away from the Big Three prior to this economic crisis -- so that the American manufacturers were already in deep financial trouble, even in good times.

More pearls of wisdom from our esteemed elected officials. This time, Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) reveals that cutting CO2 emissions will deprive plant life of precious food.

I just got back from Space X, Elon Musk's rocket factory in Hawthorne, CA where the unveiling of the much anticipated Tesla Model S was held. In a word - WOW, this is a gorgeous car!

Lots of rumors have been floating around for the past two years about the Model S, so I expected something close to what I saw, but the actual car exceeded my expectations.

First, the styling is sleek without being too flashy (see the Fisker Karma for my definition of too flashy). The drag coefficient is a very respectable .25, less than even the Tesla roadster. This will come in handy if you want to take her up to a top speed of 130 mph. 0-60 is a screaming 5.5 seconds, not bad for a family car. They will also offer a "sport version" with a 0-60 under 5 seconds. Do NOT let your teenager drive this car!

The big news for me was that the Model S will be offered with three different sized battery packs: 160 miles; 230 miles; 300 miles. The base priced model of 160 mile range is going to sell for $57,400, and after the $7,500 federal tax credit nets out at $49,900. No news on the price of the longer range models, but I can guarantee that the 160 mile model will be their biggest seller. There's very little need for the longer range car, so why pay (presumedly) thousands more and carry the extra weight around? BTW, the base model will weigh in around 4,000 lbs.

I asked Tesla's Chief Technical Officer, J.B. Strauble, whether they would be using the same battery tray for all three options and he confirmed they would.

Meet Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX). How does he know that the current climate change is just a natural process? Well, we all speak English instead of Norwegian, don't we? 

During the Little Ice Age, both the Vikings and the British adapted to the cold by changing. I suppose that one possible adaptation response of Viking retrenchment and British expansion is that we’re conducting the hearing today in English instead of Norwegian.

This video really hits home how lucky we are to have clean, drinkable water. The overall video campaign is spreading like mad. The experts say that global warming will only exacerbate clean, fresh water availability in poor parts of the world.

That's Allison Chin, Sierra Club President, behind Obama's right ear. The pic came from this story.

Here's her blog. And she recently had a letter to the editor printed in the New York Times regarding the Sierra Club and diversity.

“In Environmental Push, Looking to Add Diversity” (news article, March 10) correctly notes that the Sierra Club, like all environmental groups, still needs to embrace diversity more visibly so that together we can solve the great environmental challenges of our time.

We offer at-risk young people in the Bronx their first wilderness experience. Native American leaders guide our campaign to protect the sacred San Francisco Peaks. The incinerators planned for placement in African-American neighborhoods in Detroit are no match for our community-driven environmental justice program. And earlier this month, the Sierra Student Coalition helped bring more than 10,000 students to Washington to promote clean energy.

With the leadership of a diversity council and my election as our first Asian-American president, we are committed to becoming a more welcoming and inclusive organization.

I, too, am disappointed that change has come slowly to the environmental movement, but I am proud of our continuing progress.

Allison Chin
President, Sierra Club

Sierra Club Radio tomorrow will feature actress and MTR activist Ashley Judd.

This is what scientists across the country got in their email inboxes this week from the Cato Institute. As you can see, it's a prototype of an ad that Cato is putting together. All of those "Name Here"'s will be replaced with the names of scientists who feel Obama is off-base with his concerns about global warming. (Good luck!)

The ad will presumably be published in major newspapers at a later date. For a closer look, here's the pdf.

The scientists who make up RealClimate.org decided to post it on their blog and proceeded to debunk every facet of Cato's argument. The whole blog post is worth a read. Here's a snippet: 

There are a number of amusing details here. While we are curious about the credentials of "Dr. N. Here", we certainly understand why they are looking for a little more variety on the list. More surprising (and somewhat ironically) the mailing list for signature requests includes a number of scientists who don't agree with these sentiments at all. It's as if Michaels and Cato actually believe that these various lists of "dissenting" scientists are accurate reflections of support for their agenda. They appear to be have been conned by their own disinformation.

As an exercise for our readers, perhaps people would like to speculate on who is going to end up on the published list? (If indeed it gets published). Ginger Spice would be likely on past form, but they might improve the screening this time around…

But most amusing are the footnotes that they use to bolster their case. There are four: the brand new Swanson and Tsonis (GRL, 2009), Brohan et al (JGR, 2006) (which is there to provide a link to the HadCRU temperature data), Pielke et al (BAMS, 2005), and the oft-derided Douglass et al (IJoC, 2008).

Of these papers, not one has the evidence to support the statements attributed to them in the main text.

No one advocates vandalism, but this story was too good. With buzz of a White House veggie garden in the works, a different crop of gardeners has emerged...guerrilla gardeners! Gasp! 

That's right. These are people who are disappointed by how urban public space is used, sneak to these spots in the middle of the night, and 

plant flowers, aid urban ecosystems, and improve the quality of life for people living in the community? Sounds like the most adorable form of vandalistic rebellion ever.

(Hat tip: HuffPost)

A new Pew Research Center survey shows that nearly 60 percent of Americans support a cap on carbon emissions, which causes anthropogenic global warming. They also support making companies pay for their emissions, even if it means higher energy prices. Here's the complete survey (pdf).

Overall, 72% of college graduates support this proposal, compared with 60% of those with some college and 50% of those with no more than a high school education. Within both parties, well educated people are more likely to support setting limits on carbon dioxide emissions than are those with less education. Among Republicans, 50% of college graduates favor setting emissions limits for carbon dioxide compared with 37% of those who
have not completed college. The educational differences are even larger among Democrats (91% of college graduates vs. 62% of non-college graduates).

More women (63%) than men (55%) support placing a limit on carbon dioxide emissions. There are regional differences in opinions on this issue: Two-thirds (66%) of those living in the West support capping carbon emissions compared with 58% in the Midwest and 53% in the South. The difference is larger when regions are combined; 64% of those living in the Northeast or the West support limiting carbon emissions, compared with 56% of people living in the Midwest or the South.

I was invited to a breakfast meeting yesterday morning with three representatives of Nissan who wanted to discuss their new all-electric sedan. Two other Plug In America members joined me for what turned out to be a very pleasant and enlightening discussion.

I have to mention that, while PIA holds regular meetings with Toyota reps, we are held at arm's length when it comes to their plans for an EV or PHEV Prius. Not so with the Nissan folks. They were very forthcoming with most, but not all, information and quite enthusiastic about the Nissan EV program.

Nissan has partnered with NEC (Japan) to make their LiIon batteries, and they wanted me to be clear that it was Nissan's LiIon intellectual property that NEC was manufacturing for them. A point of pride I noted. Also, the batteries are in production now, so that may give Nissan the ability to beat many of their competitors to market with large numbers of cars. They are also planning to build a battery manufacturing plant in the U.S. as soon as feasible.

When asked about specifics of the performance and battery capacity, they were not permitted to say, but they did say it was designed from the ground up as an EV (this is key, IMO) and would carry 5 passengers at highway speeds with a range of about 100 miles.

(Photo from the L.A. Times)  

The White House has announed plans for a veggie garden. From the blog ObamaFoodorama:

[I]n the new issue of Oprah's O magazine, on news stands yesterday, she told Oprah that, yes, there will be a garden. In the same interview, she also mentioned another urban gardening project.

How visible will the garden be to the general public? The garden may be viewable from the street; there's a little access road that runs between the Ellipse and the South Lawn, which is a frequent gathering place for tourists.

Related: Crossroads has a White House petition group here.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world 

This week, we start with mountain top removal, which is getting a lot of attention lately. One of the best sources for MTR news is the Charlston Gazette. In the ongoing war between Big Coal and the people who'd rather not see mountains get blown to bits, the Gazette's blog Coal Tattoo is a must-read. The latest news is that the White House is going to step into the fray.

President Barack Obama’s top aides will be making a decision “very soon” about what they will do about mountaintop removal, according to congressional testimony today from Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

Speaking of mountains, these guys celebrated St. Patrick's Day by calling Congresspeople all day long and telling them to end MTR.

Here's an uplifting story about a planned coal plant that met its demise in Nevada.

In other news, the human health toll of climate change is very real and needs serious attention, according to WHO.

Check out this guy. He just got through a whole calendar year of being car-less after scrapping his Nissan.

In the past six months, I have spent a total of $825 on car rentals. I don't think a car purchase makes economic sense until I find myself spending 3-4 times this amount over a six month period. Given my current work arrangements, that is unlikely to happen any time soon.

Besides, I like the idea of living without a car. I will continue to put it off as long as possible, even if it occasionally means riding my bike to the doctor in the freezing rain.

In other doings...

Utilities and coal companies would like you to believe that if we don’t build new coal-fired power plants, we will all have to spend the rest of our lives shivering in the dark. But in the news this week, we find a very different story about what really happens when energy companies look beyond coal: they invest in clean, renewable energy instead.

Earlier this year, the Wisconsin Public Service Commission denied a proposal by Alliant Energy to build a coal-fired power plant. Now, the company has decided to invest that money in clean energy – specifically, wind power.

In a story with an incredible headline – “Denial of Coal Plant Blows Utility Toward Turbine Deal” – Alliant Spokesman Rob Crain says, "The PSC expressed concern over carbon, and we listened."

The coal industry has been spending millions of dollars to convince us they’re the cheapest and easiest way to keep the lights on. They tell us that change is costly, and they want you to believe that clean energy is not a viable alternative and that greenhouses gases aren’t a concern.

And yet here is a utility doing just the opposite – listening to what the public, the science, and decision makers are telling them.

Alliant in Wisconsin isn’t the only example of a switch from coal to clean energy. In February we wrote about the Highwood plant in Montana switching to wind power and natural gas.

Starting last year, the second consecutive drought year here in California, my wife and I began placing a sizable metal mixing bowl in the kitchen sink to capture gray water for use in our garden. As soon as the bowl filled up, we'd "decant" it into a bucket outside on the deck. (We live in the city and lack a plot of earth of our own, so we garden in big earthen pots.) I was blown away at how fast the bowl filled up, and how many trips I was making out to the deck just in the course of preparing one meal!

Despite getting 20 days of rain this February, we're on track for our third drought year in a row in San Francisco, and mandatory water rationing is already in place in some Bay Area counties. An article in today's S.F. Chronicle acknowledged as much and suggested that "it's time to look around and alter how we use the water we do have."

The author mentioned the bowl-in-the-kitchen-sink method my wife and I are already using, but went further by suggesting 10-gallon paint buckets with lids and handles to collect gray water from both the kitchen and the shower. (I can report from experience that even a much smaller pail-full is more than sufficient for a clean-as-a-whistle toilet flush.) And for those whose abode can accommodate a rain barrel, there's no reason these can't be used for long-term storage of water collected from indooor use, as well as from the skies. (Watch a short video on installing a rain barrel here.)

For urban- and suburban-dwellers who actually have a yard to work with, another water-saving idea that was pioneered in this country nearly 20 years ago but whose time seems to have truly arrived is the rain garden, which serves the dual function of collecting water and providing an attractive sustainable landscaping element. A rain garden conserves municipal water resources by reducing the need for irrigation.

According to the Rain Garden Network, a rain garden is simply  "a shallow, constructed depression planted with deep-rooted native plants & grasses, located in your landscape to receive runoff from hard surfaces such as a roof, a sidewalk, and a driveway." By holding runoff for a short period of time, it naturally recharges the groundwater, and studies show that rain gardens reduce the amount of runoff pollution reaching local creeks and streams by up to 30 percent.

More information can be found at Healthy Landscapes, Native Rain Garden, and Blue Thumb, to name just three online resources. You can also find rain garden resources in your area by entering "rain garden" and your home state or city into your search engine.

The good folks at The Oil Drum say we hit peak oil last year! No joke. Above is their graph. Here's their explanation:

World oil production peaked in 2008 at 81.73 million barrels/day (mbd) shown in the chart below. This oil definition includes crude oil, lease condensate, oil sands and natural gas plant liquids. If natural gas plant liquids are excluded, then the production peak remains in 2008 but at 73.79 mbd. However, if oil sands are also excluded then crude oil and lease condensate production peaked in 2005 at 72.75 mbd.

The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) should make official statements about declining world oil production to renew the focus on oil conservation and alternative energy sources.

 

 

How green is your seafood? Take this quiz and find out. There are a lot of things that may surprised you.

And for the next time you go to a seafood restaurant, an excellent resource is the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch guide.

And if you're searching for sustainable recipes in general, Crossroads has an awesome food section.

Ken Salazar's Interior Department, which has embraced the idea of offshore drilling in the past, changed course today. Salazar, who is open to the drilling mantra, instead emphasized using the waters for cleaner alternatives.

Today, Salazar appeared before the Senate Energy Committee to discuss the future of offshore waters. And, for any casual observer who witnessed the Republicans' hammering of Democrats in the offshore drilling debate last year, today's topic of discussion--using offshore lands for wind and wave energy--was likely a surprise.

 

With the big international conference in Copenhagen on the horizon, climate change scientists are starting to get bummed out. It's not easy when there's a consensus of a crisis and little is done.

Some scientists have the "climate change blues."

What haunts scientists most, many said, is the feeling that -- despite an overwhelming consensus on the science -- they are not able to convey to a wider public just how close Earth is to climate catastrophe.

That audience includes world leaders who have pledged to craft, by year's end, a global climate treaty to slash the world's output of dangerous greenhouse gases.

It's as if scientists know a bomb will go off, but can't find the right words to warn the people who might be able to defuse it.

"We are cooling. We are not warming. The warming you see out there, the supposed warming, and I am using my finger quotation marks here, is part of the cooling process. Greenland, which is now covered in ice, it was once called Greenland for a reason, right?"

--- RNC Chairman Michael Steele.

Hat tip to The Daily Dish.

San Francisco -- In some ways it's amusing to watch the seething indignation and shock from Republicans over the idea -- being floated by the Obama administration and Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid -- that a revenue-generation auction of carbon permits might be adopted by the Congress as part of the federal budget process.

The formal name for this budget process is "reconciliation," and it was adopted by the Congress back in 1974. Since that time, Congress has broadened its applicability, but its original function was quite simple: To ensure that, if a simple majority of the Senate wanted to adopt legislation that would generate federal revenues and hence reduce the deficit, a filibuster could not prevent such a revenue-increasing measure from passing.

In 1996 the Republican Congress broadened "reconciliation" to ensure that a majority of the Senate could also pass a bill that made the federal deficit worse. And in 2001 the Bush administration took advantage of that broadened reconciliation provision to pass the Bush tax cuts, which totaled $1.6 trillion dollars. Reconciliation was also used by the Bush administration and its allies in Congress to pass two other major tax-cut bills that Bush supported.

Now the Obama administration comes along and suggests that we ought to start reducing the deficit.

President Obama wants to require oil and coal interests to obtain permits for the pollution they emit.

 Not only do we face losing the polar ice caps, we're on the verge of changing the world map and displacing a countless number of people.

Here's "Global Warming 101," by National Geographic.

OK, this is a perfect situation. Think is a well known and respected EV company with a couple thousand cars on the road. They need financing to set up a production facility.

Michigan is a state overflowing with well trained and talented auto workers who are out of work.

The stimulus bill has billions available to set up production facilities where we can marry Think with an American workforce and begin getting thousands of great commuter cars on the road. Every single one of them will replace a gas burner.

If Michigan can't swing this, I know California can. The future belongs to efficiency, and no vehicle is more efficient than EVs. Those jobs will go somewhere, might as well be here in our country.

I encourage all of you to forward this email to your Senator and Rep and ask that they help make this happen. Hey, I think we should get Gavin Newsome and Villaraigosa to fight over it. San Francisco vs. LA.

Oh, and be sure to tell them you want battery manufacturing, too. Let's get this show on the road!

This video uses Google Earth for a closer look at CO2 emissions in the U.S.

The research and results were part of a project spearheaded by folks at Purdue University. For more information on this project, go here.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world

This week, RealClimate.org gave direct advice to young climate bloggers out there.

Your aim to clarify the science (or policy options or ethical considerations or simply to explain your views) is a noble endeavor and we wish you luck and wide readership. But do be aware that you are dipping your blog into sometimes treacherous waters.

Among the suggestions: own up to your mistakes, prepare to be attacked by other bloggers, and, "if you get noticed by the propagandists, wear that attention like a badge of honor.”

It also suggests avoiding World War II metaphors, to which Grist disagrees.

Silly. You should probably avoid Nazi metaphors, but in fact WWII is the only plausibly-close metaphor for the scale of effort needed to stabilize at or below 450 ppm and preserve a livable climate.

Speaking of Grist, there are a lot of comments and reactions at this blog post regarding the notion that the Chevy Volt's battery is an eco-bust. This is in reaction to a Carnegie Mellon University study, which concludes, "large-capacity PHEVs sized for 40 or more miles of electric-only travel are not cost effective in any scenario, although they could minimize GHG emissions for some drivers."

Here's more background. The study

found that small-capacity plug-ins that get less than 20 miles per charge are more efficient than conventional hybrids. And it said that large capacity hybrids like the Volt that go 40 miles or further on a charge are never cost-effective, because the batteries cost and weigh too much.

A car with the Volt's range, according to the study, would also be extremely uneconomical traveling fewer miles as it hauls around battery capacity it doesn't need.

GM doesn't like the study. No kidding. Here's the rebuttal.

In other news, if you go to bed at night and you find yourself dreaming of complete energy independence, here's an ambitious plan to achieve that dream by 2021.

Speaking of energy, Israel is going solar.

Believe it or not, a Greenpeace staffer finds Fox News cordial during an interview.

And finally, since we have bike-sharing programs, Treehugger asks, why don't we have scooter-sharing programs? I think it's a great idea!

Turn off your iPod for just one second and take a look at the AirPod.

The AirPod can travel up to 137 miles (220 kilometers) on a single 46-gallon (175-liter) tank of compressed air, producing zero emissions on the road, according to the company.

It was on display at the Geneva Auto Show. For a great photo gallery of the event, go here.

More electric trucks! I love that this market is blooming.

Fleet vehicles are perfect for EVs since the routes are very predictable and tend to be within 100 miles per day. It's easy to spec out a battery pack with enough kWh for a given size of truck to hit 60-80-100 miles, whatever the given fleet buyer needs. The longer the range, the more expensive, so you get only what you need.

Along with Tedd Abramson's Zero Truck in San Diego and Smith Trucks in London, we now have EVI (I keep wanting to write that as EV1:~). The more the merrier, the market for these is going to explode soon with Obama's stim plan and its tax of $7,500 to $15,000 for electric trucks.

Many of the companies that have fleets of trucks have buildings that are perfect for solar. Add a solar PV system big enough to offset the building's energy needs and charge the trucks, too, and you've just eliminated a whole lot of pollution, kept a lot of money from going out of the country and to the oil companies, and added value to your building. Sounds good to me.

As someone who rides a bike and a motorcycle in traffic, any time you can remove an internal combustion engine from spewing crap out its tailpipe and in your face, it's a good thing. Trucks especially.

The U.S. Geological Survey today said that Alaskan erosion doubled between 2002 and 2007. If you're wondering what that looks like, check out the above video.

Coastal erosion has more than doubled in Alaska — up to 45 feet per year — between 2002 and 2007 along a 40-mile stretch of the Beaufort Sea. This recent erosion, which resulted in the loss of several cultural and historical sites, may represent a short-term episode, or it may represent the future pattern of coastline erosion in the Arctic. These shifts are potentially a result of changing Arctic conditions, including declining sea ice extent, increasing summertime sea-surface temperature, rising sea level, and increases in storm power and corresponding wave action. A study was published in the current issue of Geophysical Research Letters and can be viewed at http://www.agu.org/journals/gl/gl0903/2008GL036205/. Additional information, including images, can be found at http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2141. You can also contact Benjamin Jones at bjones@usgs.gov or (907) 440-7404.

For the video, a hat tip to dotearth.

This is one of the first times I've seen kWh cost in a story on batteries. Ironically, it concerns an apparently faulty study by Carnegie Mellon engineers on the economics of the Volt.

A study by engineers from Carnegie Mellon University examining the economics of electricity-intensive "plug-in" hybrid-electric vehicles - a coming class of high-efficiency models typified by General Motors Corp.'s 2011 Chevrolet Volt - bases its primary argument on an outdated assumption, said one of GM's highest-ranking engineers.

The Carnegie Mellon study concluded that plug-in hybrid-electric vehicles (PHEVs) using large, high-capacity battery packs to enable propulsion for comparatively long distances solely on electric power are not the most economically viable path to higher-efficiency vehicles. It said PHEVs with more modest and less-costly battery capacity are the optimum approach.

Upon inspection, it's been revealed that the study used a price of $1000/kWh as the cost of the battery packs. Given the kWh capacity on the Volt is 16 kWh, this is a rather high price, unless the battery lasts beyond 7-8 years which looks likely. The goal is a ten year battery.

While some LiIon batteries cost $1000/kWh, it's generally acknowledged that this is a much higher price than what we'll see once the large scale manufacturing plants are on line. As a matter of fact, Toyota just released a story today about their lithium ion (LiIon) plant coming on line this year.

So clearly, the price will drop. Some companies are already saying they are down to $500/kWh and some are saying they can hit $250/kWh eventually.

Considering the federal government is now offering a full $7,500 tax credit for buying an EV, this means the first round of product will be quite affordable.

It needs to be mentioned that the well tested nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries that are in all the hybrids in the world, as well as our RAV EVs, will continue to be used. And once the patent with Chevron Texaco expires in 2014, we should see a resurgence of its use.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world

We'll start with this well-argued blog entry on the lack of empathy in the climate change debate. Rarely, when arguing with a climate change denier, do we emphasize the very real human toll of global warming's consequences:

Generating empathy both across space and through time is one of the most powerful ways we have of closing the gap between knowledge and action, and for tackling the climate crisis. The problem is that, until now, empathy has been largely ignored by policymakers, non-governmental organisations and activists.

And although Obama talks fine words about empathy, he is yet to mention it in the context of climate change or to suggest concrete measures for creating the empathy needed to help reduce our emissions. It is time to recognise that empathy is not only an ethical guide to how we should lead our lives and treat other people, but is also an essential strategic guide to how we can bring about the social action required to confront global warming.

It's hard to feel empathy toward George Will. Bloggers  continue to tear into Will's deceptive Washington Post op-ed columns. Sen. John Kerry has joined the chorus and has all but challenged him to a duel: "I know George Will well, I respect his intellect and his powers of persuasion -- but I'd happily debate him any day on this question so critical to our survival."

Moving on...I just can't ignore how cool this story is: Google Earth lets you monitor space junk that's orbiting around the planet.

Speaking of outer space, Climate Feedback, a blog at nature.com, reports that the loss of NASA's rocket that was meant to measure climate change has left scientists grieving. But there's hope that NASA will pick up the pieces and do a do-over.

Here's an idea: Carbon footprint barcodes for your groceries.

Great news! Here's a report that more than 32 million green electric cars will be on the roads by 2015.

In the meantime, you can ditch your car and join the Walk about group on Crossroads. Speaking of which, check out this blogger out of Oakland and the idea of establishing a pedestrian-only zone.

Just a few weeks ago we discussed a controversial court decision that could unleash a new wave of mountaintop removal coal mining permits. Now, it’s time for you to take action, and film star Ashley Judd has joined us in sending out the call for help far and wide.

In the past 24 hours, almost 30,000 people have answered that call, asking the Obama Administration to step in and protect the mountains, streams and people of Appalachia.

On our special web site you can ask the White House Council on Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to freeze the permitting of any new mines. Action-takers can also request that the EPA provide long-term protection for the waterways and communities of Appalachia by initiating a rulemaking process to prevent the use of mining waste as fill material.

In the wake of the devastating February court decision, Ashley Judd teamed up with the Sierra Club to step up the campaign to end mountaintop removal coal mining. With a new personal letter, video and this online “take-action,” Ashley Judd is asking the Obama Administration to prevent the issue of new permits to bury streams, and to end mountaintop removal once and for all.

Judd grew up in Eastern Kentucky and is like so many other Appalachia residents: tired of seeing such a beautiful place destroyed for coal.

“Our mountains are our heritage and our legacy to future generations,” she said. “But big coal companies are using explosives to literally blow the tops off the mountains, extract the coal and destroy Appalachia.”

This weekend I experienced something amazing. More than 12,000 youth activists took part in PowerShift 2009, and one of the hottest issues all weekend was coal – how to stop using coal and switch to clean energy.

This was a historic convergence on Washington, DC, and I was honored to be a part of such a powerful event that brought together so many great young leaders. It’s clear to anyone who attended PowerShift that he movement to move America away from coal is powerful, growing, and fired up.

Young people from every part of the U.S. and affected by every part of the dirty coal cycle attended – from Appalachia where mountaintop removal coal mining devastates communities and the environment, to American Indian reservations where water is polluted by the mining and burning of coal, and states across the nation where coal-fired power plants spew their pollution and greenhouse gases.

I don't take a lot of taxis, but I admit that when I do hop in a cab, speed and convenience are my motivation, not my carbon footprint. So I perked up while walking through downtown San Francisco this week when a Green Cab zipped by, sporting a spiffy green-and-white paint job and a checkered logo.

The company was founded in 2007 by eight veteran cabbies who were tired of getting pathetically low gas mileage in their company-issued cars.

I was able to catch a screening of the new documentary, "Fuel" and was very impressed. This is a great companion film to "Who Killed the Electric Car?".

Josh Tickell, director of the film, is a very engaging person. I met him three years ago outside the Santa Monica theater showing WKTEC, and when we met after the screening of his film, he remembered that brief conversation.

"Fuel" is in limited release, but we want it to get a wider release and to do that, more people have to see it. I encourage everyone in SoCal to go to the website and find the theaters in the LA area nearest you and see the film. If the film isn't showing near you, call your local theater and ask that they carry it. When WKTEC was showing we had instances where one or two people made a request and the film was shown in that theater.

Please see the following letter for more information....