Help Save the Planet from Special Interests:

Tell CARB What You Think of AB 32.

Can you spare a morning? How about an afternoon?
If you have a few hours on July 8, you can influence how our state will curb global warming. Will it bow to special interests and institute wimpy regulations, or will it set a strong, inspiring example for the rest of the country? You can weigh in on this question. Here’s how:
On July 8, from 9 am – 4 pm in Diamond Bar, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) will present its plan for curbing greenhouse gases as prescribed by AB 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act. The staff will go through the elements of the Draft Scoping Plan section by section, starting with a brief summary. The public will be able to comment on each section.
See the CARB plan at http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/scopingplan/scopingplan.htm

AB 32 Implementation Schedule Set by CARB.

July 8 is your chance to tell CARB that the public wants strong implementation of this law – not the slow, watered-down version that special interests want. This is your chance to communicate your sense of urgency and call for an effective plan now.
This is your chance, for example, to tell CARB that you don’t want pollution credits given away free to industries, -- polluters should have to pay for their emissions -- with the proceeds going to promote clean energy. This is your chance to tell CARB that you want strong regulation of greenhouse gases, and minimal leeway for industries to avoid it by buying offsets. This is your chance to tell CARB that you want muscular zero waste policies, with strong landfill and compost regulations. This is your chance to call for manufacturing of hundreds of thousands of Zero Emission Vehicles, maximum promotion of clean energy research and renewable energy production facilities, and all the other policies that we need to slow global warming in California. We know that many utilities and industry groups will promote a weak plan, and will urge CARB to go slow. But if enough of us show up to the CARB meeting we can make a difference.

Greenhouse gas emissions in California by sector. All sectors will require effective comprehensive strategies to get the state’s emissions 80% below 1990 levels by 2050

We can show CARB board members that the great majority of citizens care deeply about preserving the planet. We can show them that the public knows we have a Code Red climate emergency and wants stringent policies to prevent water shortages, severe heat waves, overwhelming forest fires, dramatic sea level rises, crop failures, refugee crises, spread of infectious diseases, massive species extinctions, and more.

The proposed Safe Climate Act of 2007 (H.R. 1590, Waxman) sets the 80% reduction target and requires the actions that will be necessary to avoid dangerous, irreversible warming of our planet.

This is your chance to counter industry go-slow arguments with your passion for the earth and for the future of our children, as well for survival of all our sister plants and animals. (One hundred fifty species go extinct every day – over 50,000 per year – many due to global warming.)
If you want to attend this meeting (at the South Coast AQMD, 21865 E. Copley Dr., Diamond Bar, 91765), you can carpool with members of the Angeles Chapter’s Global Warming Committee, and we will help you prepare your remarks to CARB. Please contact us at globalwarmingaction@gmail.com. If you can’t make this meeting at 9 am, you can come later. Just call Jim Stewart’s cell phone at 213-820-4345 to make sure there’s still time for public comment.
And if you can’t make the meeting, you can email your questions and comments on the CARB plan at any time to ccplan@arb.ca.gov. (Please copy us at globalwarmingaction@gmail.com) Please personalize the sample comment letter shown in the box. For an updated analysis of the Scoping Plan after its release on 6/26 (and an updated sample letter) , you can go to our website: http://angeles.sierraclub.org/environmental/CampaignsChapter_AirQualityGlobalWarmingEnergy.asp.