By Jonathan Ullman, Los Padres Chapter Director
There’s been a lot of talk lately about a Green New Deal, which is a response to planetary catastrophes of climate change and inequality.
Today’s Green New Deal is what we’re going to need to survive, just as the New Deal of 1933-1936 was enacted to survive an economic catastrophe: The Great Depression.
The National Sierra Club supports it as a “big, bold transformation of the economy to tackle the twin crises of inequality and climate change,” and a way to mobilize vast public resources to help us transition from “an economy built on exploitation and fossil fuels to one driven by dignified work and clean energy.” The Los Padres Chapter has an important role, locally and nationally, because we are a microcosm of the Green New Deal.
In Santa Barbara and Ventura counties, we have a hazardous oil extraction industry, a lack of equity for low-income residents and people of color, longer commutes in gas-guzzling cars, deadly climate disasters and at-risk wildlife. On the plus side, we have people who want to solve these challenges through clean energy technology and innovative programs to get us there.
First, consider the big oil fights. This year, oil companies want to inject high-pressure steam into the ground at Cat Canyon, in a carbon-intensive scheme to triple oil production in Santa Barbara County. Exxon wants to restart three offshore platforms using 70 oil trucks per day after a pipeline broke at Refugio in 2015. In Ventura, more wells are being allowed by county supervisors without environmental review, and there are 79 new tar sand steam injection wells proposed in the Oxnard oil field.
Meanwhile, oil companies and the Trump administration are plotting to expand fracking and offshore oil drilling on Federal lands and waters surrounding us.
Then there are the climate disasters: fires, flooding and droughts.
We also have tremendous equity issues. We have extremely high housing costs that are causing more and more of us to drive farther and farther. Last year, Santa Barbara County’s carbon numbers went up in part because of longer commutes.
We have great voters, technology and policies. We are pushing the envelope to get off oil and gas in our region.
Residents in Ventura County are now automatically enrolled in the Clean Power Alliance and can choose to receive all renewable energy sources. Santa Barbara County’s sedan fleet purchases will be all electric from here on out with many more to come. We have set ambitious goals to get off oil in our cities and our transit.
That is why it’s so exciting to be here. We are the leading edge of a Green New Deal. If we can get it right here, we’ll be a blueprint for the rest of the country. That’s what happened in the year after the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill. That’s what could happen this year if we all work together.
Here’s how: We need volunteers to make phone calls, enter data, write letters, design graphics, attend hearings and more.
Send me an email to help: jonathan.ullman@sierraclub.org
To learn more about the Green New Deal and the Sierra Club, click here.
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This article was reprinted from the April/May 2019 edition of "Condor Call," the official newsletter of the the Los Padres Chapter of the Sierra Club. To read the entire edition, click: http://tinyurl.com/CondorCallAprilMay2019