Climate Reality Project & Our Choice: environmental issues online, in video and now apps

According to the vast majority of scientists who study environmental, meteorological, and ecological sciences, climate change is very real. And mankind is playing more than a causal hand in its proliferation. We hear about it a lot but, particularly during the U.S. presidential political cycle, we also hear that it's either a fabrication, a conspiracy, or at the very least, that the science is not there and the jury is out.

Nonsense.

The Climate Reality Project is an organization devoted to disseminating the facts about climate change and our role in its existence to anyone who will listen. In mid-September, the group held a "24 Hours of Reality" where validated information was presented on the subject in the form of an online/video presentation that ran every hour for 24 hours in 13 languages around the world. Unfortunately, it did not get much media coverage but you can still see and hear the presentation yourself at the group's website.

"Climate change is not your fault for the car you drive, the lights you turn on, or the food you eat. The climate crisis is our problem. Real solutions, systemic solutions, innovative solutions, can only come when we address it together. That’s what The Climate Reality Project will do. Without doubt. Without delay. And with your help.

The Climate Reality Project is bringing the facts about the climate crisis into the mainstream and engaging the public in conversation about how to solve it. We help citizens around the world discover the truth and take meaningful steps to bring about change.

Founded and chaired by Al Gore, Nobel Laureate and former Vice President of the United States, The Climate Reality Project has more than 5 million members and supporters worldwide. It is guided by one simple truth: The climate crisis is real and we know how to solve it." - Climate Reality Project website

The Climate Reality Project can arrange to have a trained Climate Presenter speak to your school, church, or community organization and lay out the facts about climate change and what we can do about it. While founder and former Vice President Al Gore, being a politician, has been a lightning rod at times for opposing camps, his efforts to make climate change a global issue - before it becomes an unstoppable global crisis - have fueled progress in many ways. The Climate Reality Project is one; the recent app/online book, Our Choice, available from Apple's iTunes for iPad and iPhone is another.

Our Choice is a fine example of the potential for apps to provide a wide range of information. Using all manner of interactive media - video, infographics, text, and online links, it covers the current state of climate change, A to Z, and reviews the many solutions and alternatives that are at hand. Think of it as An Inconvenient Truth for a new decade. As an iPhone app, it's handy; as an iPad app, it benefits from the larger screen format (I prefer the iPad version). It is also available in a hardcover print edition.

Take a look at the Climate Reality Project or download Our Choice. The information is there. The rationale can be made for why we must act. Minds can be changed. A planet is a terrible thing to waste.

Visit the Climate Reality Project website.
Learn more about the Our Choice book/app.

Getting businesses on the side of Nature

On 06/22/07 RTSea wrote: One of the challenges we face is re-orienting the thinking of governments and industry regarding the economic impact of environmental issues. It is one thing to weigh differing business ideas and say this one is the better choice economically; the other will have to wait. But Nature does not work that way: Nature does not say, okay, since it will hurt you economically, we will just magically maintain the fish count even though you are overfishing the species. Or, sure, let us just put off the effects of global warming until you all figure out when it would be the most convenient time to deal with it.

There is an interesting trio of articles in the latest issue of Rolling Stone magazine (Issue no. 1029). First, an interview with Al Gore that is enlightening and, in many ways, optimistic. The second article goes after the positions and steps taken by the current U.S. administration regarding global warming. Depending on your political persuasion, you can take it for gospel or with a grain of salt, but there is no denying that the current administration has not made great strides in dealing with environmental issues. The third article, titled "What Must Be Done", addresses just how businesses and government can turn "green" into gold, that the so-called negative impact of addressing environmental issues has more to do with a mental mindset that prefers the status quo. The same inventive, pioneering spirit that put a man on the moon - and gave us everything from velcro to advanced computers - needs to be reawakened to address the issues facing this planet.