100% Virginia helps to develop and support local clean energy campaigns that are owned and led by community members who are responsible for the campaign decisions and work. These campaign teams coordinate with the staff organizer whose role is as a tool/resource on campaign planning and strategy and providing materials and organizing guidance as needed. 100% Virginia also creates the opportunity for people in different localities across the state to work together and learn from each other, sharing resources, information, and lessons learned.
This year, our work also requires priority to be placed on centering racial and social justice within existing Ready for 100 volunteer teams and strategies including Arlington, Alexandria, Harrisonburg, Staunton, and Fredericksburg. Addressing the internal culture, structural shifts and recruitment barriers within volunteer teams is crucial to ensuring we are conducting inclusive, equitable organizing across the state. It is our vision that we support these teams in building on the momentum of their localities commitments, to plan 100% clean energy commitment implementation work that is economically and socially accessible, community-centered, and empowering for the most vulnerable populations.
In our efforts to center racial equality and social and economic justice in our environmental conservation work, the Sierra Club is committed to working in and with communities facing the highest burden of environmental devastation to bring about a just energy transition.
Quick Facts
We are continuing the campaign with a focus on creating a power shift at the grassroots level with a widespread communications campaign aimed at shifting individual beliefs about the power they hold. Our objective is for residents in the community to realize their power and for city leaders to recognize and act on their obligation to ensure sustainability via clean, healthy, and affordable energy resources and climate resilience solutions. We aim for cities to bring about a healthier, more economically viable community via a commitment to an equitable and affordable energy system powered by 100% clean, renewable energy by or before the year 2050.
Ready for 100 localities with orange localities identified as frontline communties
FAQ's
How can I get involved with ready for 100?
- Ready for 100 is committed to supporting a campaign that is community-led. Contact paige.wesselink@sieraclub.org to discuss the support you are looking for in your community or the advocacy work you are doing/would like to do in any existing VA Rf100 locality.
What exactly is Ready for 100?
- Ready for 100 is a national sierra club campaign that supports local advocacy work for an equitable energy sector. An equitable energy sector requires centering those that are most affected by the negative impacts of environmental hazards and social injustices. Ready for 100 acknowledges that its past has not been frontline community-centered. Committing to clean energy requires committing to clean equitable energy in communities that have been most impacted by the fossil fuel industry. Joining the movement now is an opportunity to address issues that are intersectional. We don’t have one set vision of what this looks like because each community presents different needs. One community might be advocating for cheaper electricity bills while another community could be working towards improving schools. The Ready for 100 campaign is an opportunity to merge social and environmental issues to support solutions that are intersectional and equitable.
What happens to those that rely on the fossil fuel industry for income?
- When we create a clean energy sector, things like job training and clean energy ownership are part of that transition. Making job training accessible and available to those that previously worked in the fossil fuel industry as well as frontline communtiies is critical to a just transition.
Climate change is happening now, is a transition to clean energy going to help in time?
- We still have time to make a difference in the intensity of the negative effects of climate change. To not take action at all would mean we are saying yes to the detrimental effects climate change disproportionately has on already overburdened people. The fossil fuel industry drives climate change and community wide health and social injustices. Working to end fossil fuels is working to protect people's health and well being today and for generations to come.