Bill McKibben

What will you do for International Day of Climate Action on Oct. 24?

Get involved in the fight against climate change. Got plans for Saturday, Oct. 24?  Join up with climate-concerned citizens around the globe for the first-ever International Day of Climate Action, to demand that world leaders get moving in the fight against climate change.  More than 3,000 events in 170 countries are in the works, many […]

The best part about climate change

On a recent work day at the JP Green House, volunteers came out of the woodwork.Leise JonesOne of the early effects of climate change was the demise of my marriage. I was living a comfortable, middle-class life that was all wrong for my politics, and my essential devotion to simplicity. At some point in my […]

What Bill McKibben learned from the gay rights march

Courtesy half.apple via FlickrIf the mainstream media is going to largely ignore a mass demonstration on the national mall—such as Sunday’s National Equality March for gay rights—public demonstrations might as well be small, numerous, and spread all over, says 350.org founder Bill McKibben. Also, they should be beautiful. McKibben—writer, Grist board member, and an occasional […]

Pachauri’s call for 350 ppm is breakthrough moment for climate movement

Amazing news just arrived at 350.org headquarters. Rajendra Pachauri is the U.N.’s top climate scientist. He leads the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which every five years produces the authoritative assessment of climate science. Its last report, in 2007, helped set the target of 450 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in the […]

Bill McKibben talks climate on Colbert Report

Bill McKibben—author, Grist board member, and 350.org leader—appeared on The Colbert Report Monday night to talk climate change and spread the word about the International Day of Climate Action on Oct. 24. He also gave a solid explanation of the significance of the number 350. The ever-courteous Stephen Colbert threatened to upstage him by launching […]

Four years after my pleading essay, climate art is hot

That pleading little essay I wrote in 2005? It was probably the last moment I could have written it. Clearly there were lots and lots of people already thinking the same way, because ever since it’s seemed to me as if deep and moving images and sounds and words have been flooding out into the […]

Can a number save the world?

500 marshmallows organize for climate action.Robert van Waarden / Spectral QIt can if that number is 350. That’s the safe upper limit of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere: 350 parts per million (ppm). It’s also the rallying cry of a creative campaign to raise awareness of the climate crisis and build grassroots support for the […]

Anti-coal campaign gets some good news, but battle is far from won

We'll still be protesting on Monday in D.C., but it looks like the protest may be half victory party too!

Late Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sent a letter off to the Capitol Architect -- the guy in charge of buildings and grounds, as well as the century-old, mainly-coal-fired power plant that Congress owns and which is located just a few blocks from the fancy dome and the National Mall. The two leaders told him to stop shoveling coal into the power plant's boiler and finish the switch to natural gas.

Now, it just so happens that this is the same coal plant targeted for the first mass civil disobedience in the history of the American climate movement. When Wendell Berry and I sent out one of many invitations to this gathering last fall, we stressed that it was going to be a Very Serious Event; among other things, everyone was supposed to wear dress clothes. That was mostly, I think, because we wanted the home viewing audience to be reminded of something important: the crazies and loons and nutballs are not the people in the streets demanding an end to the carbon age. We're the sane ones, the conservatives seeking to preserve a planet something like the one we were born on to. The radicals are the guys who want to double the carbon content of the atmosphere and see what happens.

But now our sobriety will be sorely tested. It didn't take much of a push to convince Congress that the time for change had come. It's an almost giddy feeling -- sort of like what most of America felt on election night when the voters actually chose to elect the smart guy. It feels like the system is working (sort of) the way it's supposed to.

Not, of course, that Reid's and Pelosi's decision accomplishes all that much by itself. This is one small power plant. We need to start shutting down the whole vast coal archipelago that provides half the nation's electricity. That's going to be a tough, grinding job that requires a huge movement. And it's somehow going to have to stretch around the world, to China and India and everywhere else where coal is commonplace. (That's why we've got 350.org up and running; we're not going to solve this one city at a time).

But hey, starting Opening Day with a no-hitter is pretty darned good. Shutting down a coal-fired power plant before you even have a protest should give us some momentum to build on. Come on down Monday for the party; it's going to be a good one.

Bill McKibben is co-founder of 350.org, and author most recently of Deep Economy.

When to change that light bulb

"Often when I'm on TV, they'll ask what are the three most important things for people to do [to stop global warming]. I know they want me to say that people should change their light bulbs. I say the number one thing is to organize politically; number two, do some political organizing; number three, get together with your neighbors and organize; and then if you have energy left over from all of that, change the light bulb."

-- writer and activist Bill McKibben