Sierra Club at Climate Week NYC 2026!
Data Centers, Electricity Demand, and Clean, Affordable Power Roundtable
Co-Hosted with NRDC
Roundtable Featuring: Holly Bender, Sierra Club; McKenna Beck, NRDC; Colin McCormick, Carbon Direct; Brad Simmons, Google; John Rhodes, NYS Dept of Public Service; Sanjay Seth, NYS Dept of Env. Conservation
Holly Bender, Sierra Club’s Chief Program Officer, was delighted to moderate a panel convened with NRDC about data centers. It was an illuminating discussion about how to meet the growing electrical demand from data centers in ways that keep power affordable and reliable while strengthening the energy systems people depend on. The discussion focused on large load tariff, grid management, market reforms, demand flexibility, transmission, storage, and clean energy deployment strategies necessary to maintain affordability and reliability while supporting economic growth.
Political Giving as a Climate Solution Panel
Hosted by GiveGreen and Featuring: Pete Maysmith, President of LCV; Loren Blackford, Executive Director of Sierra Club; Jed Ober, Managing Director of the NRDC Action Fund; Erica Slates, GiveGreen Vice President
Sierra Club’s Executive Director, Loren Blackford, joined GiveGreen’s timely panel discussion about the role of climate and clean energy in this election, how electoral engagement drives meaningful policy change, and why building durable coalitions is essential to advancing climate action well beyond Election Day.
Sierra Salon
Co-Hosted by: Loren Blackford, Executive Director of Sierra Club; Jessica Sarowitz; and Kat Taylor, Founder of TomKat Ranch Educational Foundation
The Sierra Club brought together a small group of leading environmental voices in business, philanthropy, and culture for a conversation about powerbuilding at this critical moment for our country. Attendees represented a diversity of interests and expertise that make up the environmental movement, and the discussion centered on how we can come together to collectively advocate for shared climate and environmental protection goals.
Groundswell: Reception, Film Screening and Panel Discussion
Featuring Panelists: Rebecca Tickell, Director, Groundswell; Kat Taylor, President, TomKat Foundation; Laura Turner Seydel, Executive Producer, Groundswell; Loren Blackford, Executive Director, Sierra Club; Pat Mitchell, Executive Producer, Groundswell; Gally Mayer, Associate Producer, Groundswell; Regina Scully, Founder and CEO, Artemis Rising Foundation
Sierra Club was pleased to co-host the NY Premier of the film Groundswell, which is the 3rd film in the documentary trilogy created by Big Picture Ranch. These films illuminate the power of regenerative agriculture in healing the planet.
Getting to Yes: Strategies that Work to Build the Clean Energy We Need
Featuring Panelists: Holly Bender, Sierra Club; Peter Colavito, Invest in Our Future; Jessie Giles, Greenlight America; Sarah Harper, Fervo Energy; Betony Jones, UC Berkeley and Inclusive Economics; Kit Kennedy, NRDC; Mayor Indya Kincannon, Knoxville, TN
Sierra Club brought together renewable energy project developers, environmental leaders and government leaders for a panel conversation that surfaced the opportunities and tensions of the energy transition at the local project level and highlighted exactly what’s working on the ground to bring people together to get to yes on critical projects. During this panel discussion, our panel challenged our audience to think in new ways about the importance of grassroots organizing and local engagement as a critical component of winning approval today and building the long-term durable support that’s needed for the future.
Seven Sisters: Caretaking the Climate, Our Sacred Obligation
In support of Seven Sisters: Se’Si’Le
The Seven Sisters - indigenous women who are grassroots organizers, cultural artists, knowledge-keepers, and environmental leaders — shared teachings and perspectives on our relationship with Mother Earth, the challenges we face, and the responsibility we share for the future, in the beauty of the New York Botanical Gardens.
They held a powerful ceremonial gathering of music, spoken word, storytelling, ancestral wisdom, and the gift of t'əq'əq'ə—“foresight.” The ceremony was followed by a guided walking tour of the Thain Family Forest at the New York Botanical Gardens - the largest uncut expanse of New York’s original wooded landscape. The Forest remains a magnificent reminder of the beauty and resilience of nature in the face of complex human-caused disturbances.
