Last Monday I had the privilege of attending a talk by His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, climate scientists and other leaders at UC Irvine. Here are my thoughts.

An open letter to journalist Ann Curry…

Ann, you were grace itself with His Holiness last Monday. It was a joy to be there. You asked the wonderful Dr. Ramanathan “What can we do?” As a decades -long environmentalist, may I offer some valuable suggestions…

What Do We Do?

Here’s What We Can Do…

*Enact a carbon fee and dividend with 100% of the proceeds going to citizens (check out Citizens’ Climate Lobby and the REMI report) Top economists and scientists support this.

*Create Community Choice Energy districts (ending dirty energy monopolies)

*Divest of fossil fuels

*Stop oil and gas exploration

*No more new carbon-based power plants (check out TheSolutionsProject.org)

*Allow the U.S. military to switch to renewable energy NOW (check out TheBurdenFilm.com)

*End fossil fuel subsidies

*Halt fracking for oil and natural gas

*Discontinue offshore drilling

*Create Community Action Plans in every state and city

*Shut down all tar sands operations

*Support mass transit projects

* Produce only electric and/or ultra-high mpg cars

*Install solar, wind and geothermal power

*Lessen meat consumption, range free/grass fed

*Retrofit buildings for energy efficiency

*Buy local, organic and sustainable products

*Plan smaller families

* and as His Holiness so wisely alluded to; grow food, use the land. We can in fact, sequester all the carbon we’ve launched into the air on 11% of currently unused farmland (check out “The Soil Will Save Us” by Kristin Ohlson)

*Solutions are plentiful; we just need the courage to face the problem. Thanks for all you do and check me out on TheGreenFlash.com