The Power 2 Change is Sierra Club's national clean energy advocacy campaign to educate the public about what is at stake in the 2008 elections.
Through national and local earned media events, grassroots and online organizing in nine key states, and aggressive outreach on the internet, the Power 2 Change campaign will define the contrast between competing visions of our energy future, position clean energy as an economic driver, and underscore the importance of the commitment of our leaders up and down the ticket - including a new President - to moving America in a new direction toward a clean energy economy.
The choices we make in 2008 will define our future - especially when it comes to the election and energy issues. The contrast between competing visions of America's energy future could not be sharper this year: We can move forward to a clean energy economy that creates jobs, save consumers money and solves global warming, or we can continue the expensive, polluting policies of the past. We have the technology and ingenuity. What we have lacked is the political will and leadership. We need to challenge all our elected officials - including the next President - to provide the leadership we need to move us forward.
For the last seven years, the Bush Administration has promoted energy policies that have produced record high oil and gasoline prices, delivered historic profits for the big oil companies, kept us dependent on foreign sources of oil, and put us dangerously behind in combating climate change. Oil companies have reaped record profits of more than $100 billion while consumers continue to pay record prices at the gas pump and for heating oil.
But we have the power to change direction. The technology exists now to move us beyond oil and coal to a clean energy future driven by wind, solar and other renewable sources of power, along with cost-saving energy efficient buildings, cars and appliances. This vision of America's energy future is not a distant dream, it is a change that's already underway - a change that's already creating and keeping thousands of jobs in our country, generating profits, saving money and cutting the carbon emissions that cause global warming.
What we have lacked is the political will and leadership. We need to challenge all our elected officials - including the next President - to provide the leadership we need to move us forward.
The Power2Change campaign involves an unprecedented investment of organizing staff and resources in nine states: Colorado, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Virginia, and Wisconsin. The state campaigns will use a combination of earned media, grassroots outreach, online advocacy, and Earth Day events and rallies to generate public demand for clean energy options and ask elected officials to commit to moving a clean energy agenda locally and nationally.
Specifically, the Power2Change campaign will document and release examples of clean and polluting energy options within each state, tour those clean and polluting energy sites with reporters, collect and deliver petition signatures demanding elected officials help build a clean energy economy, and recruit volunteers to meet with elected, business and community leaders and to participate in Earth Day events around April 22.
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