(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Climate Strike -- We Are Here (week 78) [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-09-13 You can make a difference to the hurt being caused by climate chaos and the great extinction event, in your town or your city! How? Reuse, repurpose, and recycle this information. You can push your local politicians to act. It will make a difference. This is the letter for week 78 of a weekly climate strike that went on for 4 years in front of San Francisco City Hall, beginning early March 2019. For more context, see this story. For an annotated table of contents to see topics for all the strike letters, see this story. Meanwhile… STRIKE FOR THE PLANET We’re down to now or never, do or die. Let’s review. This week’s topic is We Are Here. AREA PROBLEM POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS BIODIVERSITY extinction — 1 in 5 species currently is at critical risk of extinction with that rate rising to 1 in 2 by the end of the century1 biohighways, insect gardens, native urban forest, victory gardens2 ENERGY energy that produces CO2 or other GHGs or that destroys ecosystems is energy that creates more problems than it solves3 produce green and renewable energy locally for a locally controlled and owned grid4 FIRE lots more, bigger, deadlier, and frequent fires create more pollution, slides, and health impacts5 plant a native urban forest, more local breathable spaces FOOD less diversity6, fewer nutrients7, more bad food8, less food overall9 local victory gardens with a strong focus on natives, promote locally grown foods in season, put a Carbon added fee on all food coming from out of state10 HOUSING not enough, not good enough (including transportation that isn’t car-centered and actively trying to kill us11) small, dense, primarily residents and not commuters, with transportation and food surrounded by green spaces12 INJUSTICE BIPOC and the poor get screwed on all fronts, from housing to health, and always in terms of pollution. Reparations and Restorative Justice now!!!!!13 OCEAN RISE it’s coming up fast14 Plant the coasts and move back from them, put infrastructure uphill.15 PLANNING no one in power is planning for the world that exists now, let alone the world we’re heading for16 talk to the people who have actually been doing the work (like 350), and let SFE do their job! Keep the good ideas from the pandemic and expand on them: Slow Streets, Upper Great Hwy Park, expanded outdoor dining, increased outdoor options generally PLASTICS they’re EVERYWHERE17 This is killer stuff. We have to stop allowing it to poison our city. RESILIENCE yeah, we don’t have the breadth of resources in place to be resilient18 blackwater recycling, native urban forest, plant coastal buffers, grow local food, local recycling and reuse, reclaim space now wasted on cars for appropriate urban housing and urban living, support local banking, work with the bay area counties, demand diversity and inclusion in all city spheres TEMPERATURE RISE it’s going up fast, and hitting high temps for longer times every year19 increase our albedo, plant a native urban forest, more water features in the city (especially in places that have little to no water features), stop supporting cars!! WATER megadrought and stupid water politics (such as the Delta Tunnel project and raising dam heights) Fight the Delta Tunnel20 and any water thefts, figure out how to give up Hetch Hetchy (cause it’ll happen whether we plan for it or not),21 blackwater recycling now, get rid of cars (and the multiple ways they pollute the water), grow natural filtration and buffering systems and TIME we have so much less time than we thought22 ACT NOW Yeah, it’s not good But there’s so much we can and must do! 23 And this is it. This is your last best chance to act before all that’s left to you is reaction. Reacting, as America’s Covid-19 response has shown, is so much more expensive and less effective than acting in the first place. Look at it like this: You’re at the top of a massive killer wave. You either try your best to ride it, or you do nothing and wipe us all out with you. So your dithering had better finally be done You have 11 weeks left in which to start the necessary big actions if we’re going to survive. 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 In a little over a year, our species has lost 10 years time in which to act. The Guardian’s climate countdown gives us 14 days to save the earth.32 So yeah, please finally get to work! FOOTNOTES 1 “Percent of species in critical risk of extinction”. The World Counts. Accessed 21 October 2020. https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/planet-earth/forests-and-deserts/species-extinction-rate/story . 2 See Strike letters weeks 6, 9, 22, 27, 44, 45, 48, 55, 59, and 76. 3 Steve Hanley. “100% Renewable Energy For 139 Nations Detailed In New Stanford Report”. CleanTechnica. 23 August 2017. https://cleantechnica.com/2017/08/23/100-renewable-energy-job-growth-139-nations-detailed-new-stanford-report/ . 4 Kara Manke. “Our energy grid is vulnerable. Locally sourced power may be the answer.” Berkeley News. 11 October 2019. https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/10/11/our-energy-grid-is-vulnerable-locally-sourced-power-may-be-the-answer/ . 5 “The Long-Term Health Impacts of Wildfires”. Healthversed. 15 October 2018. https://healthversed.com/2018/10/the-long-term-health-impacts-of-wildfires/ . 6 Seth Cook. “Why food diversity must be on the menu”. International Institute for Environment and Development. 14 October 2016. https://www.iied.org/why-food-diversity-must-be-menu . 7 Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss. “Dirt Poor: Have Fruits and Vegetables Become Less Nutritious?” Scientific American. 27 April 2011. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-depletion-aND-NUTRITION-LOSS/ . 8 Bee Wilson. “Good enough to eat? The toxic truth about modern food”. The Guardian. 16 March 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/mar/16/snack-attacks-the-toxic-truth-about-the-way-we-eat . 9 Laura Reiley. “U.S. faces shortage of up to 8 billion meals in next 12 months, leading food bank says”. The Washington Post. 2 October 2020. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/10/02/food-bank-shortage-feeding-america/ . 10 See Strike letters for weeks 61 and 62. 11 Lauren Hernandez. “Two injured after minivan jumps curb, crashes into S.F. restaurant”. San Francisco Chronicle. 20 October 2020. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Two-injured-after-minivan-jumps-curb-crashes-15663210.php . But it is easy to find local stories about cars making life in SF unsafe. Also see Strike letter week 63: Carmageddon (it’s happening now). 12 Marco Amati. “How many people make a good city? It’s not the size that matters, but how you use it”. Phys Org. 7 August 2018. https://phys.org/news/2018-08-people-good-city-size.html . 13 See Strike letters weeks 15, 23, 55, 58, 64, and 70. 14 Kimberly Amadeo. “Rising Sea Level Effects, Projections, and Solutions”. The Balance. Updated 8 April 2020. https://www.thebalance.com/sea-level-rise-and-climate-change-4158037 . 15 See Strike letters weeks 5, 11, 16, 22, 59, 74, and 76. 16 Justin Worland. “The U.S. Isn’t the Only Major Country Not Meeting Its Climate Goals”. Time. 27 November 2018. https://time.com/5463519/climate-change-united-nations-report/ . 17 Katharine Gammon. “Groundbreaking study finds 13.3 quadrillion plastic fibers in California’s environment”. The Guardian. 16 October 2020. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/16/plastic-waste-microfibers-california-study?ref=hvper.com . And see Strike letters weeks 31 and 41. 18 Erik Oster. “In San Francisco, Agencies Confront Their Failed Promise of Racial Diversity”. AdWeek. 25 September 2020. https://www.adweek.com/agencies/in-san-francisco-agencies-confront-their-failed-promise-of-racial-diversity/ . But this problem is across the board. 19 Kendra Pierre-Louis. “Heat Waves in the Age of Climate Change: Longer, More Frequent and More Dangerous”. The New York Times. 18 July 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/18/climate/heatwave-climate-change.html . 20 See Strike letter week 46: Delta Tunnel. 21 Eric Niiler. “As Snow Disappears the Sierras and Rockies Are Shrinking”. Wired. 12 December 2018. https://www.wired.com/story/as-snow-disappears-the-sierras-and-rockies-are-shrinking/ . 22 Rosamond Hutt. “9 climate tipping points pushing Earth to the point of no return”. World Economic Forum. 5 December 2019. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/12/climate-change-tipping-points-earth/ . 23 Please see all the weekly Strike letters. It’s all there. 24 Matt McGrath. “Climate change: 12 years to save the planet? Make that 18 months”. BBC News. 24 July 2019. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48964736 . 25 Heather Smith. “Climate Change: Even Worse Than We Thought”. Sierra. 8 October 2018. https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/climate-change-even-worse-we-thought-ipcc-report . 26 Michael Grose and Julie Arblaster. “Just how hot will it get this century? It’s worse than we thought”. Phys Org. 18 May 2020. https://phys.org/news/2020-05-hot-century-worse-thought.html . 27 Amelia Urry. “The scientist who first warned of climate change says it’s much worse than we thought”. Grist. 22 March 2016. https://grist.org/science/the-scientist-who-first-warned-of-climate-change-says-its-much-worse-than-we-thought/ . 28 Rafi Letzter. “Today’s Climate Change Is Worse Than Anything Earth Has Experienced in the Past 2,000 Years”. Live Science. 25 July 2019. https://www.livescience.com/66027-climate-change-different.html . 29 John D. Sutter. “Vanishing”. CNN. Accessed 30 June 2020. https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2016/12/specials/vanishing/ . 30 Peter Castagno. “Biodiversity Loss Worst in Human History — 1 Million Animal Species Risk Extinction”. Citizen Truth. 6 May 2019. https://citizentruth.org/biodiversity-loss-worst-in-human-history-1-million-animal-species-risk-extinction/ . 31 Kristen Callihan. “Earth’s Currently Ongoing Sixth Mass Extinction Is Worse Than We Thought”. OutwardOn. 7 August 2017. https://www.outwardon.com/article/earths-currently-ongoing-sixth-mass-extinction-event-is-worse-than-we-thought/ . [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/13/2192137/-Climate-Strike-We-Are-Here-week-78 Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/